Chapter 22 Dina
Dina
Eleven days to the match
The Divas are on a streak. Unfortunately, it’s a losing streak.
Since agreeing to the match with Maya’s team, we’ve played three teams, and have even increased our weekly practise sessions.
The team has been getting better with every match.
Today, they were tied with the other team until the second half of the match, when things fell apart.
It’s the best they’ve done so far, and I’m proud of them, even if there is that thread of worry that they will never be good enough to beat Maya’s team.
Since we set up this match between us, I’ve been thinking about Maya as this person I have to beat.
An obstacle in my way. And this match as my chance to show her once and for all what I am capable of.
But the fundraiser has changed things. I’m now thinking of her as Maya, the girl I used to date, who was my first love, who betrayed me and everything that we were. Who I might still have feelings for.
It didn’t help that I came home from the fundraiser to look Maya up, trying to find the truth of what she had confessed to me.
For the first time, I’d understood what she must have been going through over the past few years.
I started noticing the snide tones of the articles about her, the dismissiveness of videos.
And even when Maya was being lauded with praise, the comments below were tarnishing her; calling her names and telling her that she was less capable than the other players.
Just a few minutes of reading those comments was enough to make my blood boil.
All of these thoughts are swirling around my brain when I enter the restaurant after losing yet another match.
Deen is waiting for me at one of the tables, studying the place intensely.
He invited me over because he said he wanted my opinions on some things.
Since Ma still refuses to help with renovations at the restaurant, I’ve been Deen’s one and only confidante when it comes to what he wants to do with the place.
‘I feel like I can already see it,’ Deen says when I approach his table. He doesn’t greet me, doesn’t even turn to look at me.
I slump down on the chair next to his. ‘What can you see?’
‘The way it’s going to look after a renovation.
We’ll get new tables and chairs, and we’ll have a big, fancy sign up on that wall’ – he nods to where he’s looking – ‘that’ll say the restaurant’s new name.
Nobody’ll even know what this place used to be, and we can have a relaunch to celebrate the new place. ’
‘You’re going to rename it?’ I ask. I’m fully onboard with all of Deen’s renovation plans, I always have been, but the restaurant’s name is something that Baba picked out: Ekushey.
If you translate it literally, it just means twenty-first, but in reality, it means the day we honour the martyrs of the Bengali language movement: the twenty-first of February.
After our victory day, it’s probably the most celebrated occasion for Bengali people.
Baba lost one of his uncles on that day; he had more reason than many to want to commemorate it and so he had, in the form of this place.
His dreams; for his uncle and for his people.
‘I know the name meant a lot to Baba …’ Deen says slowly, carefully. ‘But people don’t know what it means unless they’re Bengali. I thought something more catchy would help attract people, you know? Maybe something like Calcutta Kitchen.’
‘We’re from Bangladesh, not West Bengal,’ I point out drily.
‘You know what I mean,’ Deen says. ‘Besides, Indian restaurants do better than Bengali restaurants. Maybe that’s what the rebrand needs to be.’
‘Hm,’ is all I say, because while I get what Deen is trying to do, I don’t know if I want him to do those things. It feels like he’s stomping all over Baba’s dreams.
Deen finally turns to me with a frown. ‘Hm? What is that supposed to mean?’
‘Just hm,’ I say.
‘Since when do you reserve your opinion from me?’
‘I’m not reserving my opinion, I’m just … thinking about it.’
Deen clearly doesn’t believe that I’m taking my time to think about it, but he still humours me, talking me through his vision for the restaurant. How he would redecorate, what the new menu would look like, the dishes that he would have on it.
‘Is this really what you want?’ I ask finally, once he’s done.
‘Yeah, obviously. Aren’t you the one who talked me into it?’
‘I talked you into doing something with the restaurant, not this specifically. It’s just that this is your chance to make this place what you want it to be.
Not what Baba dreamt of, or what Ma wants to maintain it as.
But, also, not what other people want, or what you think they want,’ I say.
‘Your food is good, Deen. Some of the best food ever, you know that. So make this place your vision. Not someone else’s.
And if that includes changing the name and calling it an Indian restaurant, then OK, I’ll support you.
But if that’s not what you want, don’t throw away this opportunity. ’
I feel better after saying my piece.
Deen sighs and sits back on his chair. ‘Yeah, you’re right.
I don’t know. I was doing all of this research into the restaurant business, and I feel like I got caught up in this idea of wanting this place to be a success.
I mean, I do want this place to be success, but maybe …
that doesn’t mean I have to take away from what makes it special. ’
‘I agree.’ I give him an encouraging pat on the shoulder. ‘Instead, think about all of the things we’ve talked about in the past. All of the wild ideas we’ve had for this place.’
‘Right, they never involved changing the name or advertising ourselves as not being Bangladeshi. Just being … more,’ Deen says.
He has a faraway look in his eyes and I know that he’s already envisioning something – the dreams that he’s told me about for the past few years.
I can see them too, unfolding in front of me in this restaurant.
I want to have hope for my brother that this place will be successful soon, that it will be brimming with customers.
But even if that doesn’t happen, I’ll still be proud of him for giving his dream his best shot, and not compromising.
‘I might need to dip into my savings to do everything that needs to be done,’ Deen says after a moment.
He’s always been scrupulous with his money, something that I would never have expected from him.
But after Baba passed away, Deen was stuck with the responsibility for what felt like everything, and it made him more careful.
Far from the kid in school who got detention every other day and almost got suspended on more than a few occasions.
‘It’ll be worth it,’ I say encouragingly. ‘And whatever happens, I’ll be here with you. Just tell me what I need to do and I’ll do it.’
Deen gives me a smile. ‘So, how are things going with the team?’
I groan. That’s the last thing I want to talk about.
‘Another loss, huh?’ Deen asks.
‘We got closer this time,’ I say. ‘I’m proud of them, but I just wish they could magically become superstar footballers overnight.’
‘They’ll get there eventually.’ And I know Deen is right, I just worry that eventually might be too late for the match against Westbrook – which will send a whole slew of disappointment through everyone on the team.
There’s less than two weeks left until the match, and we still have a long way to go until we’re ready to beat them.
‘You had that catering job Aisha got you this week, right? How did that go?’
‘It was fine.’ I shrug. I haven’t told Deen about the fundraiser, running into Maya there and what transpired between us. Because I know that he will read more into it than he should, give me hope about something that I don’t even want to think about.
‘Just fine?’ he probes.
‘It was a job. I was a server. That was it.’
‘What was the event?’
‘It was boring, do you really want to hear about it?’ I ask the question with a roll of my eyes, but clearly Deen isn’t buying my lies.
‘You’re being weird about it, so yeah, I want to hear about it. Was it for something weird? Was it like … a furry convention or something?’ Deen grins.
‘No, it wasn’t a furry convention. It was … a fundraiser.’
Deen keeps looking at me expectantly, so I know I have to say more.
‘For … women in football.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Yeah. I know. Just my luck, right?’
I expect Deen to drop it at that, but he tilts his head to the side and studies me. ‘And what else?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Dina.’
‘I think you and I are too close. It’s not very healthy.’
Deen gives me a poke in the ribs and I pull away from him, groaning.
‘OK, OK. Maya was there.’
‘Really?’ Deen’s eyebrows shoot up. ‘So … did you guys talk?’
‘Why would you think that?’
‘Because the fundraiser happened a few days ago, and you haven’t been talking my ear off about how much you hate Maya. You haven’t even mentioned it.’
I guess I’m more of an open book than I thought.
I know that Deen isn’t going to let up, so I spill about everything that happened.
How she ran into me, how angry I was. Then, seeing her upset and following after her.
Her panic attack and how I calmed her down.
Her speech. And our conversation afterwards.
The one proper conversation we’ve had in nine years that hasn’t erupted into a fight.
That felt like being back to the old us.
‘Wow. So, what are you going to do?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean … you guys actually had a conversation with each other. She even thanked you for helping her. You’re not going to try to reach out to her?
Talk to her again?’ He’s studying me a little too closely and I worry that he can see everything in my expression – my confusion, my desperation, my longing.
But I don’t even know what any of it means.
I would be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about it.
That I hadn’t spent the last few days thinking about barely anything but Maya.
I even asked Jen for her phone number, pretending I needed it to make arrangements for our match.
But I haven’t called or texted her. I’m not sure what it would look like to open up a line of communication with her again.
I’m not sure how to be around Maya when I still feel angry about everything that has happened in the past.
‘Look, Maya is … She’s … We’ve always been …
’ I keep stopping and starting, trying to find the right words to describe things but coming up blank.
But finally, it just spills out of me, like I’ve been holding it all in; a dam waiting to burst until this moment.
‘Maya and I have always been complicated, but I obviously have thought about her over the past nine years. I’ve thought about her, like, every single day, no matter how many times I didn’t want to think about her.
And her being back is just … weird. But not even weird bad.
It’s just … I don’t know. It feels like I finally have something now, you know?
With the football competition and going up against her again.
It feels right, like this is what I was missing in my life. ’
Deen just shakes his head, chuckling like I’ve told him some kind of joke instead of spilling my heart out to him.
‘None of this is funny,’ I say angrily.
‘Actually, it’s all kind of hilarious. Dina, you and Maya have a pattern.’
‘How can we have a pattern when we haven’t seen each other for the past nine years?’
‘Because it happened before. When the two of you were so obsessed with each other, all you could do was compete in whatever you could compete in. If it wasn’t trying to outdo each other in your classes, it was trying to outdo each other on the football pitch.
And now you’re doing the same but with the teams that you’re coaching.
The writing is on the wall, Dina. You like her, she likes you. Now what are you going to do about it?’
And when Deen says it like that, it almost sounds that simple.
‘But too much has happened between us. She … betrayed me. And she left,’ I say.
‘Overdramatic.’ Deen gives me a pointed look.
‘Dina, you can hold on to the past and refuse to forgive Maya, if that’s what you want.
And if it was, then I would support you.
But I don’t think that’s what you want. Because you wouldn’t have thought about her for the past nine years, or avoided anything to do with her during that time, if that was the case.
Maya obviously means something to you – she meant something to you then, and she means something to you now.
’ He looks me square in the eye as he repeats his question again.
‘Now, what are you going to do about it?’
And even though I don’t want Deen to be right, I know that he is. I’m the one who is in the driver’s seat and I have to do something.
I have to make a choice about Maya.