Chapter Two
My mother, Ajita Salvi, and Druv’s mother, Romona Kalra, have been besties for the past year and a half, and all Naperville’s tight-knit South Asian community, a.k.a. Brown Town, knows it. My parents have lived here since before my birth, but the Salvis weren’t always part of the establishment. We aren’t the norm here. My parents aren’t doctors, partners in consulting firms, or IT company bigwigs. They own Bombay Masala, our town’s oldest South Asian grocery store.
My father came here thirty-five years ago with big dreams and the fabled eight dollars in his pocket—and even those were borrowed. A distantly related uncle needed someone to run his grocery store and he sponsored my parents’ visas. For almost twenty years, Aie and Baba ran the store, barely making minimum wage. The uncle always took the “distantly” in “distantly related” very seriously. Right from the start, he made it crystal clear that they were employees, the hired help, and not family.
My parents worked around the clock and raised us in the apartment above the store. Aie also made and sold rotis and snacks and cooked and cleaned for private parties. And Baba probably cooked the books a little, because just before his uncle died, they were able to buy the store.
Until then we’d stayed on the fringes of uppity Brown Town. Rumi and I were never invited to the birthday parties or even to playdates at the McMansions. Sometimes when Aie helped serve and clean at the parties, she took me with her, and the hostesses, bedecked in designer wear and diamonds, sliced up giant pieces of cake for me with that benevolent look that tried for generosity but couldn’t help but give off charity. When I was very young, I loved going because the cake was always incredible. Baked by an auntie who’d taken a baking class and started an artisan cake business focused on nostalgic flavors like mango, saffron, and pistachio. As I got older, run-ins with the kids I went to school with became progressively more awkward, and I started to beg Aie to let me stay home, cake notwithstanding.
When my parents bought the store, I was thirteen years old. Within two years of buying the store, my parents bought a McMansion of their own in one of the aspirational subdivisions. Suddenly, the Salvis slid from the fringes to inside the hallowed circle.
Aie and Baba took to their new status with the zeal of converts. They replaced our secondhand Chevy Caravan with his-and-hers luxury cars: a Mercedes and a BMW (which have now been replaced by matching Teslas). My mother started getting keratin treatments and gel manicures and bought a Louis Vuitton bag with the unmistakable monogram proclaiming our hard-won bougieness. Rumi and I were expected to be models of good behavior, always well turned out in identifiable brands, always excelling at school, always volunteering at the temple in our finest Indian designer wear.
We were expected to guard the family’s position with the fierceness of children who understood the sacrifices our parents had made so we could have the life they gave us.
Back then it felt like a lot, but now I know how ungrateful we were. My parents could have let my teenage rebellion destroy me, but they cleaned up my mess and set me back on my feet. Rumi doesn’t see it that way. Maybe because what they see as his rebellion, unlike mine, isn’t rebellion at all. It’s simply who he is. Someday they’ll see that. They usually see things in the end. It just takes them time. The chasm between how they grew up and the world in which they raised us isn’t an easy one to cross.
As far as Rumi is concerned, they’re out of time, and he’s angry with me because he thinks I’m making excuses for them.
I watch them now, entirely at home in the high-ceilinged great room of Druv’s parents’ house. There’s an understated elegance to the Kalra home—all subtle accent walls and moody art pieces. Masks, mirrors, and bells cover entire walls in perfectly arranged clusters. Books, lamps, and lush fabrics work together to turn furniture into statement pieces. Old money, my aie calls the Kalras. Based on the pictures Druv’s mom loves to share, the houses they grew up in back in Delhi are just as grand as this. I’ve never understood why people like that would leave their home to be outsiders in someone else’s land.
Druv says his parents craved the adventure and independence. They grew up with American music, movies, and clothes, so it called to them. My parents, on the other hand, obviously craved the ability to feed their family. Which they have. They educated all the children in their extended families back in their village in India; they bought homes for their parents; they even bought Baba’s cousin a new hip last year.
I watch him, my rail-thin father, his shoulders permanently stooped from years of leaning over a cash register. His silver hair is still thick, he sports a goatee, and he’s wearing the lilac Brooks Brothers polo I gave him last Father’s Day. All the men he’s talking to are similarly dressed: the golf uncles in branded polos humblebragging about their handicaps and bragging-bragging about the courses they’ve played. Druv’s father belly laughs at something Baba says, and they slap each other on the back. I try to remember a time in my childhood when I saw my father laughing and I can’t, so this is nice.
Aie is with the aunties in the kitchen. Even though Druv’s mom has two people helping her serve and clean, I’m certain the aunties are in there proving their domestic-goddess cred by helping the helpers. I try to imagine my life like this: entertaining, keeping house, raising family, building community. The details are startlingly clear, but the entirety of it, the bigger picture, that part I can’t seem to visualize.
“Here comes the bride,” Ariana, Druv’s younger sister, announces as she wraps me in a hug. She’s wearing a perfectly fitted ribbed tank dress that’s bright red and ends a couple of inches below her butt. It’s something my mother might strangle me for wearing. A Van Cleef & Arpels pendant that reminds me of a four-leaf clover hangs delicately around her neck, just the way it hangs around the necks of several of the girls she grew up with. Druv’s mother gave me one when we got engaged. Mine is tucked under my gray linen jumpsuit with cap sleeves and a cowl-neck. On my earlobes are the sensible but absurdly pricey solitaires my parents gave me for the same occasion ( Three-quarters of a carat because we don’t want to look like we’re trying too hard ).
Ariana and I hold hands and compliment each other’s clothing.
“I’m guessing Dr. Kalra-the-Second isn’t here yet,” she says, calling it. Druv is running late. Which is perfectly understandable, given Jake’s hairline fracture situation.
Before I can respond, she rolls her eyes and turns to the woman standing behind her, and my stomach drops. Priyanka Joshi. I didn’t notice her standing there. Possibly because she was trying to make her escape so she didn’t have to talk to me.
Priyanka and I went to high school together. We were friends for a few months our junior year until she quit the Young Feminist Leaders club. Or more accurately, until I caused her to be removed from her position as club president. My face turns hot. She’s refused to look at me since the incident.
Her disgust is as thickly palpable as it was when we were seventeen. Without acknowledging me, she hands one of the two glasses she’s holding to Ariana. They were obviously hanging out before Ariana noticed my presence. My presence, which is enough to make Priyanka drop an air-kiss on Ariana and walk away, head held high, not even a flicker of recognition in my direction.
She’s as stunning as she was as a teenager. No awkward phase for Priyanka Joshi. While the rest of us brown girls stumbled into freshman year with unwaxed upper lips, unibrows, frizzy hair, and acne stubble, Priyanka breezed in looking like a Bratz doll. All glossy hair, long-lashed eyes, petite frame, and the kind of comfort in her own skin that baffled the rest of us.
As she walks away, I notice she still has that self-possession that flashes me back a decade. I haven’t seen her since then, but what I did to her is a nudging splinter of guilt that’s been stuck under my skin. Now it pushes against a nerve, and I want to run after her and apologize, but the disdain in her demeanor was so clear that I’m frozen.
“I didn’t realize you were friends,” I say to Ariana, and despite my best effort not to give anything away, I study her to see if she knows what happened between Priyanka and me.
“We used to live next door to each other until her parents moved to the city. I was much younger. She and Druv were the ones who were inseparable.” A flash of doubt passes in her eyes. She’s not sure she should have said that, and she rushes on. “She went to college out of state. She just got a job in Chicago and moved back, so Mom invited her over.” Her gaze follows Priyanka until she disappears out of the room. “I wanted to be her when I grew up.”
I think I did, too, but I can’t admit it. Priyanka was the only girl I knew who didn’t care about what anyone else wanted her to be. Until they—we—found a way to break her.
“She was always so badass, I could never have imagined ...” Ariana catches herself. “I’m so glad she’s okay now.”
“What happened?” I ask, and the splinter turns sharp.
“She’s been pretty open about it, so I guess it’s not a secret. She was in and out of rehab for a while.” Suddenly she looks guilty. “I’m not gossiping, I swear.” Ariana is just twenty-five, a good ten years younger than Druv, but she has his inherent kindness, that same intentional commitment to being a good person and doing the right thing that I love about him.
“It’s okay,” I say, but I feel anything but okay.
Priyanka’s voice from a long time ago echoes in my head. That club was my whole life. I hope someone ruins your life too.
“What’s wrong, Mira?” Poor Ariana looks worried, so I push away the ancient memories and smile.
“Nothing, I’m fine,” I say. But I can’t leave it at that. “Can you excuse me a minute?” It’s been thirteen years. And yet I’m knocked off balance by the clarity with which I remember the expression on Priyanka’s face when she told me to go to hell. “There’s something I need to take care of.”
Fortunately, an auntie accosts Ariana and starts gushing about how great she looks, so I slip away and follow Priyanka.
I have no idea what I’m doing or what I hope to accomplish, but I also can’t believe I’ve let all this time go by without an apology.
“Priyanka!” I call after her in the empty corridor that connects the living room with the kitchen.
She stops but doesn’t turn around. Her stance tells me she was hoping I wouldn’t chase her. I walk around her, and she looks at me with utter incredulousness.
“It’s ... it’s been a long time. It’s good to see you looking so well.”
“I’ll bet it is,” she says and starts walking away.
“I wanted to ... I wanted to apologize,” I say, almost relieved that she seems to have no interest in making this easy for me. “I never meant for you to lose your—”
“Please don’t.” Her face is entirely expressionless when she turns to me. None of the hurt from years ago, just a blank calmness. A look people often get when they recall past pain that they’ve worked hard not to feel anymore. “I’m sure you want to vomit your feelings all over me so you can feel better about being a vicious little shit. Maybe go to your mommy and she can fix this for you too? I’m not interested in your catharsis, so leave me out of it.” She turns away again but then stops. “If this is about me telling poor Druv who you really are, don’t worry. I’m not in the business of crushing other people’s dreams.”
This time she does walk away, and I feel like I’ll never move again, like she just hammered me right into the floor.
I don’t know how long I’ve been standing there when Ariana finds me. “There you are. Did you need something?”
I shake my head. “No. I was just going to check on Druv.” I hold up my phone. My limbs have gone cold and stiff, and I pray that she doesn’t see it.
“Good luck finding any privacy around here.” She winks. “Did Priyanka go this way?”
I point at the kitchen.
“Oh no! She just walked straight into the coven of aunties. They’re going to attack her with a hype fest of all the single guys in Brown Town. I have to go rescue her.” With that she traces Priyanka’s footsteps and is gone.
I force myself to move and return to the living room, where Druv’s mother and Arti Auntie, one of her girl gang, find me.
“Were you talking to the Joshi girl earlier?” Arti says, looking over my shoulder. “She looked remarkably normal.”
Druv’s mom frowns, albeit gently. “She’s a good girl, Arti. She’s been through a lot. Give her a break.”
“Right,” Arti says. “Now that Druv is all settled with someone else, it’s easy for you to say.” Before Druv’s mom responds, Arti puts both hands up. “I’m only joking. All I mean is that I’m glad she’s done with her wild phase. Her poor mother must be relieved. I just want all the kids to be happy.” With that she turns her focus on me. “Look at this one here. Always been such a good girl. None of that attention-seeking nonsense.” She squeezes my shoulder, and the cold, sick feeling Priyanka’s words left inside me bloats. “So, I hear Druv is taking you to the Ritz-Carlton for your engagement honeymoon.” She wiggles her perfectly filled-in brows.
“Mira deserves no less, and my Druv knows it.” Druv’s mom puts her well-sculpted arm ( Three days of Zumba and two days of weight machines, thank you very much ) around me and engulfs me in a cloud of White Linen. I haven’t told her yet that the trip is canceled. She’s been so excited about it, I just didn’t know how to break it to her. “And it’s called an engagement-moon, Arti!”
Arti Auntie chuckles bawdily. “Oy hoi, look at you making sure your son and daughter-in-law don’t do honeymoon before marriage.”
I almost choke on my wine. Ever since Druv and I got engaged, it takes the aunties and uncles precisely five minutes to maneuver every conversation with us toward sexual innuendo.
“Mira knows I’m the kind of mother-in-law who wants her to have a healthy sex life, right, Mira? We’re friends first.” She smiles at me in commiseration.
Mortification steamrolls over all the other emotions raging inside me. That’s an upside, I guess. A furious blush warms my cheeks. Which makes the two of them so happy they burst into delighted laughter and pat my cheeks.
“Romona, your daughter-in-law might be the only modest girl we have left in the community. How precious! I can’t remember the last time I saw a young woman blushing.”
Until I got engaged to Druv, everyone treated me like I was an old-world spinster on the shelf. Not exactly done at almost thirty (because everyone is progressive now) but with my chances of “settling down” pretty much dismal (because everyone is also still a “realist”). Druv’s a man and he went to med school, so the same standards don’t apply to him around here. Since my engagement to Druv, however, I’m treated like a bud in first bloom.
Druv’s mother is possibly the most sensible person I know, but even she looks proud and doting about what she sees as my modesty. What it is, in fact, is just me being a grade A dork.
“I would have killed for my mother-in-law to look at me like that.” My mother joins us, and her face is bursting with so much smug satisfaction that my flush deepens to a different shade of embarrassment. She presses her knuckles into her temples to ward off the evil eye and pats my cheek with the kind of affection I’ve hungered for all my life. “Did you know Mira has had her bag packed for weeks? I’ve never seen her this excited about anything. I told her, ‘Calm down, you have a lifetime with your Druv . ’ So eager.”
All three women burst into more of those innuendo-laced giggles.
I know they mean well. I know they didn’t grow up with this kind of freedom. They probably think they’re being generous with me right now, because their elders gave them nothing but rules and shaming. My mind still slips to my childhood, to the things I’ve heard said about me and Priyanka and every other girl I grew up with. Slutty ... too dark ... too plain ... chubby ... skinny ... mousy ... bossy ... damaged goods ... past her prime. Not in his league.
I try not to think about their reactions when they find out that Druv canceled the trip again.
I try to manufacture a smile, but I can’t seem to manage it. My chest feels tight. The pressure of things I don’t want to remember squeezes like a corset, cutting off my breath. Before I can figure out what’s happening to me, Druv enters the party, a good two hours late.
He’s startlingly handsome in his midnight blue button-down and slim-fit dark jeans. His hair is freshly washed and slicked back. He stopped at his place to clean up even when he knew he was late. I can practically smell his bodywash and cologne even from this far away, and his confidence that no one will call him out for his lack of punctuality.
“Excuse me a moment,” I say to the aunties.
“Of course,” Romona says and winks at her son as his face breaks into a smile at the sight of me.
Every single person in the crowded room seems to be watching us as we make our way to each other. Druv takes my hand and places a kiss on my cheek. Playing to the gallery but also keeping it intimate.
“What’s wrong?” he asks near my ear, picking up on the discomfort churning inside me.
“I need air,” I whisper even as I fight to understand my rioting emotions.
“Hey, can you help me grab something from the car?” he says loud enough for our audience to hear and leads me out the front door to some good-natured hooting.
As soon as the front door shuts behind us, I press my hands to my face. I’m shaking. “I’m so sorry,” I say.
Druv pulls my hands away from my face with so much gentleness that some of what I’m feeling settles.
“Mira, honey, what’s the matter?”
“I don’t know,” I squeak. I want to scream it. Everything is so great, so great, but I can’t seem to shake off this pressure in my chest. I want to say that, but I don’t know how to.
“Did our moms say something about the canceled trip?”
I force myself to breathe. I’ve been avoiding it, but he finds the source of my discomfort, my panic, and I’m immensely grateful to have that thread to hold on to. “I didn’t tell them. And I haven’t canceled yet. I haven’t had the time.”
He rubs my back. “That’s fine. We’ll tell them together.” He throws a look over his shoulder at the line of cars in the sweeping driveway. The din of music and laughter spills from inside the house.
“They’ll never understand,” I say, surprised at how despondent I sound.
What’s even more surprising is the realization that it’s not about whether they’ll understand or not. I don’t want to cancel. As soon as I admit it to myself, the knot of panic in my chest eases.
I want to go to New York. I need to. I need to see the Statue of Liberty and ride a subway and eat pizza and buy kababs from a food truck. I need to see my brother. I have to see my brother.
I’ve never left Illinois by myself. But I have to see Rumi.
“I can’t leave the practice with Jake’s arm broken, Mira,” Druv says.
“I know. Don’t you think I know that?”
He glances at the gigantic lead glass front door, then at the landscape lights casting halos around trees. When his gaze returns to me, there’s an odd expression on his face. “What if you don’t cancel?”
My heart skips a beat and fills with hope a little too fast.
“It’s already paid for. What if you just go by yourself?”
“You’d be okay with that?” As soon as I say it, something gathers inside me, and I stand up straighter.
“I think so.” There’s so much kindness in the way he looks at me, I know exactly what his patients feel like. Why they let him dig up their spines. “It’s not like you broke Jake’s arm.”
“You didn’t either,” I say. “I’d much rather go with you. But ... but I’ve already taken the time off.”
He runs his hand through his perfectly cut hair. “That’s true,” he says as though he hadn’t thought about that until this moment. “You’ve been working so hard.”
I have. I just finished my postgraduate work in post-op care for spinal surgery, which I managed with a full-time job and while doing all the wedding planning myself because no one has expected Druv to have the time. I also still help my parents out at the store. No wonder I almost had that totally out-of-character breakdown just now. I also just quit my job at the pain center so I can join Druv’s practice next month after my trip to India. The timing for our engagement-moon was supposed to be perfect.
The timing is still perfect for me. “You sure you’re okay with that?” I ask.
“Yes!” he says without a moment of hesitation. “I want you to go have fun. Get away from the moms and their wedding obsession. You need this.”
I do. Recklessness grips me. I’m doing this. I’m going to New York by myself.
I kiss him. A quick but fierce peck on the lips. Everyone is right. How did I ever get lucky enough to find him?
He looks surprised but delighted. I’m not exactly comfortable with physical affection. He’s been immensely patient with me in that too. He looks like he might lean in for another kiss, eyes aglow with hope, but I pull away and turn to the gigantic door. One step at a time. It’s how I’ve always lived my life. This moment. Then the next.
Telling everyone we’re canceling our trip was going to be hard enough. I can’t even imagine telling them that I’m going by myself.
I ignore the disappointment on Druv’s face and brace myself for the avalanche of disappointment that awaits us on the other side of the door.