Chapter 16
chapter 16
The following morning, Dev sat on the bleachers and watched with a morbid kind of fascination as Garrett Rooney, an auditing and assurances accountant who towered over their basketball group by at least five inches, dribbled with determination toward the unguarded basket. He was going for a dunk. He always went for a dunk.
And he always biffed it. Despite his six-foot, four-inch frame, Garrett’s spindly legs never seemed to secure enough air time for him to make contact with the basket’s rim. With his eyes squinting in concentration, he followed his usual formula: he traveled illegally, attempted a mighty leap, and, with giant hands outstretched, missed the bottom of the net by several inches. The ball slipped from his hands to ricochet off the back wall of the gymnasium.
But, as usual, the rest of the guys, most of whom were under five-seven and would never dare to attempt such a feat, clapped Garrett on the back with a chorus of “good try, man” and “so close, dude” platitudes. Likewise, Garrett nodded gratefully while eyeing the basket with a glint in his beady eyes. He would try again.
As the guys resumed floundering across the court, Dev leaned back and shook his head as he took a swig of water.
“Dude has heart,” his closest friend of the group, Prakash Talwar, said from where he sat beside him. Before enrolling in the CPA program, they had met at the University of British Columbia and immediately bonded as two sheltered brown kids having moved away from home for the first time. Together they had learned how to operate laundry machines, which libraries were the best for late-night studying, and where—for the ultimate moment of weakness—to find food that reminded them of home.
Dev laughed. “He’s clueless.”
“At work, too.” Prakash shook his head. “No self-awareness, that guy.”
They watched as Harry Tsai weaved his way down the court and successfully shot a three-pointer. He was the shortest and most talented of their motley group, and head of the forensic accounting department at Prakash’s firm. He found Dev and Prakash on the sidelines and waved them over.
When they both declined, he shot them an unimpressed look before turning to rejoin the laughable hustle of the other players.
“I know my excuse,” Prakash said, pointing to his ankle wrapped in a sporty-looking brace. He had required ankle surgery in high school and could only play for a minimal amount of time before needing increasingly long breaks. “What’s yours? As one of our more skilled players, you and Harry run circles around these guys until the college crew gets here for their pickup game.”
It wasn’t high praise, given the level of talent on the gym floor. Still, Dev half smiled. “I didn’t get much sleep last night.”
“You’re still unemployed, right?” Prakash leaned in, his voice lowering with excitement. “Wait, did you land the job yet?” Prakash was the only one in the group who knew of Dev’s real reason for leaving his firm. As Penticton was Prakash’s hometown, he knew many of the accountants at Dev’s well-known firm, and so Dev had told him the truth as a fail-safe. Besides, he trusted Prakash.
“I’ve been checking, man,” Dev replied with a rueful sigh. “None of the professional or semiprofessional sports teams are hiring for positions I want. But I’m going to keep trying.”
“Your family know yet?”
“Nope.”
“Shit.” The word conveyed everything: a Sikh Punjabi from a very traditional family, Prakash knew exactly why Dev was leaving his family in the dark. “You’re not panicking and staying up late combing for work, are you? I can help you out if you’re low on funds.”
Dev’s chest tightened pleasantly, and he threw his friend a grateful look. “No, I’m good.”
“So, what’s got you losing sleep?”
Tipping his head back for a swig of water, Dev stalled. Although Garba had always been one of the few cultural events he enjoyed, it had never left him on a peculiar adrenaline high before, with the echo of the dhol pulsing through him every time he had tried to drift off to sleep last night. Well, the drums and the delicate clink of turquoise bangles jostling together against his chest.
When Dev’s face reddened and he didn’t answer, Prakash smirked. “Or, should I say, who’s keeping you up at night?”
Hastily, Dev lowered his voice and told Prakash about Naomi, the brand-consultant-turned-buffer-turned-fake-girlfriend. Since his brain still felt rain-muddled from the previous night’s events, he decided not to mention Garba. And the parking lot.
Prakash was grinning like an idiot when he finished. “So, you like her.”
“It’s not like that.” Dev’s protest sounded feeble in his own ears.
“Dude, I’ve known you for a long time. I know when you like someone.” Cockily, Prakash tossed his water bottle in the air and caught it with a loud thwap . “And it sounds like you’ve got it bad.”
“Fuck.”
“What’s the big deal? You finally like a brown girl.” Prakash raised his hands, palms up, toward the ceiling. “Your mother will rejoice on the hilltops.”
“She’s not the right kind of brown.”
“I thought you said your family doesn’t care if you marry a non-Bengali.”
“No, I mean, she’s not the kind of brown girl you bring home to your family.”
Prakash’s forehead wrinkled. “Tattoos? High school dropout? Divorcée? Single mom?”
“She’s not in touch with her roots,” Dev said glumly.
Prakash winced, familiar with the ramifications. A brown person who failed to uphold any cultural identity whatsoever? Unspeakable. There was an unspoken hierarchy of authenticity, and despite everything that drew Dev to Naomi, she was on the bottom rung in his mother’s eyes.
“Ah, whitewashed,” his friend said with a sigh. “That sucks, man. My parents can’t seem to trust people who stray away from the culture…” Prakash was silent for a moment before he snapped his fingers. “What’s the big deal? Just go for it in secret. You’ve done it before.”
It was a normalized thing, younger generations hiding relationships—especially unsuitable ones—from their families so they could enjoy dating without the added stress of dealing with parental interference. Immigrant South Asians, particularly those with arranged marriages, did not understand casual dating. And the idea that their children might be engaging in premarital sex was never talked about, as if forced ignorance signified it wasn’t happening.
It was ridiculous. But it was a burden that all the first-generation kids bore.
“It’s not like you want to get married eventually,” Prakash added, leaning his elbows onto the bleacher behind him. “You’ve always been anti-marriage.”
“That’s true,” Dev said slowly. He could apply the same set of rules to Naomi as he had in the past: a mutually agreed fling between two people who wanted to continue operating independently with an understanding that there would be an end date.
Yet Dev wasn’t so sure he wanted to hold himself back from Naomi and all that inexplicable warmth that radiated from her, lighting everything and everyone in her path.
Maybe it was just infatuation—he’d known her for only a little while, after all—and when the bazaar’s completion date rolled around, these feelings could fade. His past relationships usually did at the three-month mark.
A small part of Dev wondered what Prakash might say if he mentioned these confusing thoughts, but he immediately tamped down the urge. Dev never talked about this kind of stuff with anyone, and although Prakash was a good friend, there was no way Dev could reveal this side of himself without making things awkward and embarrassing them both. No, it was better to keep the words—and his feelings for Naomi—lodged in his chest in the hopes that eventually they would just go away.
But when the realization that he’d be seeing her later that day brought a faint smile to his lips, Dev stood up abruptly, his skin suddenly two sizes too tight.
“You wanna get back in the game?” Prakash asked, standing up at a more languid pace and stretching his back.
On the court, Harry was eyeing them again, more insistent this time. Behind Harry’s back Garrett aimed a sloppy pass at Ben Fields that nailed the recipient flat on his face. Even that looked a lot less painful to Dev than dealing with his own feelings.
“Yeah, let’s go.”
When Dev returned to the bazaar, Naomi was waiting outside the door, looking unusually antsy.
“What?” he asked wearily, his eyes dropping to his feet. Since their kiss, he wasn’t entirely sure where to look. The gentle caress of her rain-soaked curls against his cheek was still etched in his mind, as was the sweep of her lush, dark eyelashes when her eyes had fluttered close as she’d leaned into him. He’d never forget how her perfect, pink lips had looked when they’d pulled apart—wet, swollen, and addictive.
Dev didn’t dare let his mind wander to what might’ve happened had they not been interrupted by the catch of her bracelets against his kurta.
“I have something special for you waiting inside,” Naomi said, oblivious to the dangerous turn of his thoughts.
Dev grabbed the towel draped over his shoulder and wiped his forehead. Despite the earliness of the day, he could already feel the humidity. The sudden heat had nothing to do with the beautiful woman beckoning him forward, practically shimmering from excitement.
“It’s too early for strippers,” he said.
Naomi rolled her eyes as she laughed and pulled the front entrance open. Dev stepped inside, momentarily taken aback, as he always was, despite having worked on the rebrand every day for over a month.
Oak floors gleamed against freshly painted teal walls. Gone were the tired-looking shelves, and without the overcrowded aisles of wall-to-wall junk, the room was airy, open, and dust-free. Nick had built custom floating shelves along the far back wall, where Aashi had agreed to lend her pottery collection for display. Aside from the long L-shaped display counter, there had been no furniture in the room. Until now.
In the corner next to the pottery wall sat a burgundy couch and a small table painted the exact same color as the walls. Equally sized wooden chairs surrounded the four sides of the table, which also housed a large wooden bead maze.
“What’s all this?” he asked as Naomi fussed with positioning the chairs just so.
“Whatever happens to this café,” Naomi said, contemplating her work before adjusting one of the chairs again, “it’s clear that family matters a lot to your mother. And you. And while I know you don’t have the best childhood memories of this place, you mentioned that you guys had a little craft table in the corner to keep you guys busy while your mom worked. I thought this would be a nice touch. It’s a nod to the bazaar’s history.”
An image flitted from Dev’s memory. He had been eight or nine on summer vacation, coloring at a plastic kids’ table in the corner with five-year-old Dhan. His little brother, an artistic child, had barely looked up the entire time they were there, so consumed by his drawing. But Dev’s focus kept returning to his mother, chatting and laughing with customers. She had brought a large container of sandesh with her and happily offered the popular Bengali sweet to anyone who glanced her way. It was a memory he’d shared with Naomi several weeks ago, a careless remark when they’d been at one of the many furniture stores she’d dragged him to, arguing over table heights.
He looked at Naomi in surprise now. “I can’t believe you…” Words failed him. It wasn’t just that she’d listened to him and committed something so small to her memory. She’d folded the moment into the bazaar’s rebrand and her thoughtfulness made Dev’s rib cage expand, his chest impossibly full.
When he trailed off, Naomi shot him a nervous glance. “It’s a really good idea,” she said defensively. “Cafés aren’t always kid-friendly, but this little corner will elevate your business for parents. And up your sales, too, since you’re selling desserts.” When he didn’t answer, she relented. “We can get rid of it if you want. I know it wasn’t part of my initial design, but—”
Dev placed a hand on her shoulder. “It’s not what I expected,” he said. “But it’s perfect.”
When her body relaxed under his hand, Dev didn’t immediately let go. He didn’t want to, not when he wanted so much for Naomi to understand that he didn’t have the exact right words to explain the sudden catch in the back of his throat. How could he express how good and right it felt to be standing there, with her, between the walls that had housed the better part of his childhood? How, for the first time, he could look around the bazaar and see light and history and the ways in which his mother carved a life for herself in this country?
He didn’t have the words, but he knew he didn’t want to stop touching her with the same certainty that there was no way he would be sick of Naomi when the three-month deadline passed. He would never step foot in the bazaar without thinking of her, regardless of who claimed ownership in the end. She was etched in every detail of the café: the vibrantly painted walls, the comfortably rounded corners of the glossy white display counter, and the very carefully selected solar shades hanging at the windows. She would be there, too, when a patron curled grateful fingers around a steaming cup of chai in the middle of winter, and when a relieved mother curled up on the couch with a magazine, her children busy coloring at the kids’ table and feasting on gulab jamun.
It was perfect. A place for sweet tooths and seeking comfort and trying new things. Dev’s mouth was dry as he watched Naomi straighten the coloring books and crayons. He wasn’t sure why watching her complete such a mundane task made his fingers itch to touch her again, but this time, in that sweetly curved hollow of her lower back, but he knew one thing:
He didn’t want these feelings going away anytime soon.