Chapter 10
Twelve days until the wedding
When Leo opens his eyes, he doesn’t remember where he is.
He’d been dreaming that he was in a three-legged race, except that his partner was an enormous and impatient bull.
He sits up, shoulder clicking as the springs underneath him groan in a way his carefully selected memory foam mattress does not.
Then he remembers he’s on the pullout sofa in the Chopras’ study, feet hanging off the edge.
It is going to be a long two weeks.
The clank and clink of dishes from somewhere beyond the wall to his left alert him that he is not the first one up.
It’s been years since Leo woke to a busy household.
Once Liv went off to college, it was just Leo with a front-row seat to his parents’ excruciatingly slow slide into separation, their lives scheduled so they never had to be in the same room as each other: his dad taking on all things related to Leo’s burgeoning hockey future, his mom there for the rest. When they’d announced they were getting a divorce, Leo was almost relieved.
A loud clanging is followed by a muffled swear from Ravi and then Manjula laughing. It’s the sound of family. It’s nice.
Shit. He corrects his inner monologue: Ravi uncle and Manjula aunty.
Per the text thread, the most basic of all rules is that any person a generation or more older than you becomes an uncle or an aunty, regardless of the actual relationship.
He scrubs a hand over his face as a knock sounds at the door.
Rishi steps into the room. “Hey, good morning.”
“Good morning,” Leo replies, a little sheepish as he tries to comb his flopping hair into submission with his fingers.
He’s invited himself to their wedding, though the way Rishi explained it the night before, that’s not a huge faux pas.
Uninvited distant relatives are known to just show up.
But he’s not a relative. He’s not anyone to any of these people except Simran.
Rishi’s parents were welcoming but it is two weeks till their son’s wedding; the last thing they need is a houseguest. “Look, I have to say it again, thank—”
“My mom already thinks you’re great because you loaded the dishwasher last night,” Rishi says with a laugh. “It’s cool, man. Simran has always been like a sister.”
“She told me you and Geeta have been together since high school?” Leo asks.
Rishi turns the desk chair around and sits in it, smile fond with remembering.
“Neighbors since we were kids, started dating my junior year. She was so smart, she was in all my classes, even though she was two years younger. We’ve been together eleven years, can you believe that?
” He sounds a bit like he can’t believe it.
“Your relationship is a sixth grader,” Leo replies. “That’s incredible.”
“If it makes you feel better, Veena aunty really didn’t like me when we were younger.”
“Why not?” Maybe whatever Veena aunty didn’t like about Rishi is something Leo can sidestep and get ahead of a little bit.
“Well, she was deeply suspicious that I was into one of her daughters,” Rishi says.
Leo’s phone pings and he purses his lips as he scans the email. “My boss doesn’t sound thrilled. But she’s given me the okay.”
“Sometimes, that’s the most you can hope for with a boss,” Rishi says.
Leo shakes his head, even as a low-grade anxiety settles into him.
“It’s not like that with Amerie. I work at a translation company for film and TV streaming services and production houses.
We do subtitling, dubbing, all of it. I came to New York for an internal interview that she helped set up for me.
If I get it, I’d head up the entire French team in Toronto. ”
“So you’re worried about being here while they’re making the decision,” Rishi says.
Leo waves it away. “It is what it is. What about you?”
“I’m a data scientist at a tech company.” Leo waits for more details. “But more importantly, I’m out of the office for a month for the wedding and honeymoon and I’ve been pretending like I don’t have a job at all, and it’s freaking great. So listen—”
He produces a sleek laptop from under his arm and comes over to sit next to Leo with palpable excitement. As he opens it, the whole screen is taken over by a colorful slide with the heading: OPERATION DDLJ.
“You made a PowerPoint?” Leo says, laughing.
Rishi grins back. “It’s my love language.” He FaceTimes Kavitha, who answers with Simran sitting next to her on the bed in one of their rooms. “Did you get the file?” he asks. It reminds Leo of his sister: No greetings needed.
“You look so normal. I’d never guess you were a recreational Power-Pointer,” Kavitha says.
Leo’s gaze catches Simran’s. If he’s still a little in disbelief that he’s agreed to this …
scheme, here’s his anchor to it all. Once he’d moved back to Toronto after being away for a few years, things had started blooming between them.
That first night he’d shown up at her and Liv’s doorstep, she stared at him for a full minute, mouth open, before catching herself.
And that was all he’d needed to flirt with her relentlessly from that moment forward.
Who they were to each other completely changed: He stopped being her best friend’s little brother and she was no longer this untouchable goddess he couldn’t form sentences around.
Yesterday, watching the movie, sparring with her cousin—she was alive in a way he’s never really seen. She’s already a fuller version of herself here than she was in Toronto.
“Hey,” he says softly, and though the words get lost under Kavitha and Rishi arguing about using Comic Sans ironically, she hears it and smiles, the warmth in those big brown eyes making him feel about ten feet tall.
“I thought we could look at the pain points of Operation DDLJ, maybe blue-sky some solutions,” Rishi says.
Kavitha guffaws loudly. “Bro, tell me you don’t think it’s okay to talk like that outside of a work email.”
Rishi ignores her and presses the space bar. The slide breaks into pieces as the next one moves in its place with a swooshing sound.
The slide features a bulleted list:
I: Veena Iyer
II: Ashok Iyer
III: The Community
“Basically, there are three key stakeholders you must win over to execute a successful Operation DDLJ,” Rishi says. “Veena aunty, Ashok uncle, and every single person they know.”
“Is that how he’s going to move the needle?” Kavitha asks.
Simran chimes in, “Maybe we can circle back to close the loop.” Kavitha’s mouth twitches with the effort to not smile.
“Shut up, both of you,” Rishi says. “Number one and the most difficult: Veena aunty herself.” He presses the space bar and the image on the screen compresses into a tornado that funnels into itself.
“These transitions are taking me back to the sixth grade,” Kavitha mutters.
The new slide features a sepia-toned picture of a younger Veena aunty.
Her face is smooth with youth as she stands next to a sign that reads THERESA ROAD, PONDICHERRY.
Underneath the picture of Veena aunty, there are two columns, “Likes” and “Dislikes.” There is only one item in the Likes section: “telling people what to do.” Underneath the Dislikes, written in tiny font, there are at least forty things listed.
“So I should avoid”—Leo squints as he reads off the list—“talking to, breathing near, or even knowing Veena Iyer’s daughters without her explicit permission.”
Rishi presses the space bar. “Let’s go to number two.”
The next slide has a picture of Ashok uncle on it and the same two columns underneath. Under Likes: cricket, Golden Age Hindi music, walking slowly, silence. Under Dislikes: unknown.
All four of them are silent for a few seconds.
Kavitha asks, “Leo, do any of these—”
“No,” he replies. “I don’t even know what age of Hindi music we are in now.”
“What about silence?” Kavitha asks hopefully.
Simran stifles a laugh. “Leo is many things but silent is not one of them.”
“Okay, let’s try door number three,” Rishi says, clicking to the final slide.
Leo’s face scrunches in confusion. “The Community? Sounds like a cult.”
“You’re not far off,” Simran says. “The Community is all of Veena perima and Ashok peripa’s closest friends, whose opinions they care about.”
“The Community is also every single person they’ve ever talked to who is Indian, whose opinions they also care about,” Kavitha adds.
Next to Leo, Rishi looks apologetic. “I can’t help you here because I was born into The Community.”
“He got grandfathered in. Literally,” Kavitha says.
“So basically, we’ve got nothing,” Leo says.
“Less than nothing,” Kavitha replies. “You’re already on the outs with Veena perima. It’s going to take something big to get to neutral with her. What about your job? Are you a lawyer, engineer, or doctor?” Leo confirms he is none of those. “And you’re too tall, Amma doesn’t like tall people.”
“I can’t control my height!” Leo says.
She gives him a look through the screen. “A fact that makes you weak in Veena Iyer’s eyes.”
“This is achievable, guys,” Rishi says. “We just need to break it down into small tasks to get some wins.”
“Sure, let’s try that!” Kavitha says. “By day five, Leo should have at least three members of The Community on his side. By day seven, seventy-five percent of my father’s daily words spoken should be with Leo. By day nine, you should be drilling down for a deep dive that achieves synergy.”
“Now you’re just saying things that don’t mean anything,” Rishi complains.
“Isn’t that the point of corporate jargon?” Kavitha shoots back. “Maybe we get you some facial prosthetics, Leo, like you’re in an Oscar-bait movie. You’re not allowed to be handsome if you’re not Indian—Amma will just be more suspicious of you.”
“That’s it!” Rishi says. “I know of a way we can get Leo an in with The Community.”
“How?” Kavitha asks.
“Give me a couple of days.” Rishi turns to him. “Leo, you’ll have to trust me on this one.”
Leo stares at him warily. “I’m staying in your house so I don’t think I’ve got a choice. But just so you know, you’re giving more mad scientist vibes than data scientist right now.”
“What are you planning, Rishi?” Simran asks.
He steeples his fingers and grins over them. “Let’s just say I’ve found some low-hanging fruit.”