Chapter Five
Five
The mehndi hall overflows with lanterns and brightly colored flowers. When it comes to desi weddings, I try to make an appearance at the mehndis, the henna party the night before the actual nuptials, when things are a bit more casual and everyone’s nerves are slightly less frayed than on the actual wedding day. Tonight, the walls practically pulse to the beat of the bass. I press my fingers to my own throbbing temples. Music and mehndis have been inextricably tied together since the beginning of time, though they didn’t always feature deejays blasting pumped-up Bollywood tunes that make the floor vibrate. My head pounds in sync to the rhythm. The bride and groom have not yet made their appearance, but I’m hoping they arrive sooner than later; with this impending migraine, I may need to make my exit earlier than expected.
I head out of the hall and bypass the black-clad security guards monitoring guests entering and exiting the festivities. I need to find a quieter place, at least for a little while.
“Nura!” The bride’s mother sidesteps security and hurries toward me. She looks stunning in a silver sari. “I thought I saw you.”
She wraps me in a warm embrace.
“You are glowing,” I tell her.
“Inside and out. Truly,” she says. “You know how high-strung Avani can be. The life coach you suggested changed everything. And then—Dev. He is the best thing that’s ever happened to us. It’s like my daughter says, you really are magic.”
“Avani and Dev are a great fit,” I tell her. “All of us at the agency wish them both a lifetime of happiness.”
“From your lips to God’s ears.” She looks at me anxiously. “You’re not leaving yet, are you? My sister is dying for you to meet her daughter. Avani’s success churned up a lot of interest in you. After the rasms are taken care of, we can make some connections with a few interested parties?”
After the rituals? I try to not wince. At the rate things are going, I’ll be here past midnight.
“I nearly forgot.” Her eyes light up. “That journalist who came by to interview us was absolutely lovely. Of course we sang your praises to him.”
“Journalist?”
“The one from Rolling Stone . He reached out last night to see if he could get some quotes on our experience working with you.”
“He’s here?”
“He was .” She glances around, then back at me. “Is that all right? I’m sorry—I assumed you knew.”
“It’s fine,” I lie.
“ Rolling Stone . Well done, dear. Avani was thrilled.”
My headache pierces my temples. One more thing to deal with. I promise her I’ll be back, and cross the hotel lobby. When I enter the lounge, the hoopla drifts down to a faint rumble, and the lighting is blessedly dim. I take a seat at a barstool, retrieve my emergency stash of Advil, and ask the bartender for a club soda.
Pulling out my phone, I text Azar.
You’re late.
His reply is immediate.
On my way!
I purse my lips. He was supposed to be here half an hour ago. Three dots appear on the screen again and then:
Azar: I’ll make it up to you. Promise. Save me some Brazilian steak?
Nura: They haven’t even served appetizers yet.
Azar: So I’m NOT late! Ha! Be there in a sec
I down my medicine and hope it kicks in soon. Once Azar’s here, I’ll feel more settled.
I type Rolling Stone, Logan Wilson into my phone’s search engine as I flag down the bartender.
“Another club soda. With lime, please?”
“Why not an actual drink?” a voice says.
There’s a man three stools down. I hadn’t noticed him before. He’s white, with brown hair parted to the side and piercing blue eyes.
“Last time I checked, this is a drink.” I raise my glass.
“You like lime?” He motions with his shot toward my glass. “How about a mojito, then?”
I don’t bother to reply. Instead, I busy myself with my phone. I don’t drink. Never have. But I don’t owe him an explanation. That’s one thing so many of our clients fail to realize, especially the people pleasers: Folks can ask you for your time, but they are not entitled to it. Until Azar arrives, I can occupy myself. When I glance up a few moments later, the man is staring at me with an expression I can’t decipher.
My search results load just as he says, “Nura Khan?” A grin spreads across his face.
Logan Wilson. Of course it’s him.
“I was hoping I’d run into you.” His demeanor shifts. Like he went from black-and-white to full color. “I’m Logan Wilson. I emailed you earlier this week. Not sure if you saw it, but—”
“You didn’t mention you’d be following me here.”
“I’m in town wrapping up a piece but couldn’t resist a chance to sidebar with you. I saw Avani’s client testimonial on your website and figured I’d reach out and get a chat in with her as well. She had nothing but glowing things to say. What you’re doing—what you’ve accomplished—it’s incredible. Non–Silicon Valley startup. Zero venture capitalist funding. Grassroots app to the core. An in-depth profile could be huge for both of us. I did that Brad D’Angelo profile. If you like, I can share my process and how it works?”
I look at his eager expression and shift in my seat. I don’t love that he took it upon himself to show up uninvited, but I can grudgingly respect his resolve. I think of the inbox overflowing with hate mail after the Vanity Fair piece. If I said yes to an interview in a high-profile magazine like this, it wouldn’t be to advertise the agency, it would be to set the record straight. A piece with a journalist like him would certainly be definitive. Maybe…
“And I must say I’m impressed,” he continues. “You’ve made arranged marriages all the rage again.”
Aaaaaand there it is.
“Do you label other relationship services the same way?” I ask. “Or only when the founder is a Brown woman?”
His face reddens a touch. “I—I didn’t mean…Okay, yes. That was inappropriate of me. I apologize. This is exactly why you should talk to me, though.” He rushes to add, “People have misconceptions. This would be your chance to correct them.”
Oh, to have the confidence of a mediocre man. I stand up. It’s time to face the bass-filled mehndi hall, migraine be damned. I put a twenty-dollar bill on the counter and move toward the exit.
“That recording was something else, wasn’t it?”
My stomach turns. Logan’s eyeing me steadily. “Whoever it is, he has a real vendetta against you. So much pent-up aggression. Any comments on that? Off the record?”
“Men feeling angry they didn’t get whatever it is they wanted isn’t news, is it?” I say. “If you want clickbait, you can move along. You won’t get any from me.”
A hand grazes my shoulder. Azar. Handsome as ever in his fitted black sherwani.
“Sorry to interrupt,” he says. “Quick word, love?”
“You are interrupting nothing,” I tell him.
“I was just heading out.” Logan sets his shot glass on the bar and drops a few bills. “Nura, it was nice to meet you. I’m sorry for putting my foot in it. I do hope you’ll consider getting in touch.”
He walks out of the lounge. I watch the automatic doors slide apart as he exits the main hotel in the distance. Only then do I exhale.
“What was that about?” Azar frowns.
“A reporter. He’s gone from calling and emailing to stalking, apparently.” I fill him in on our conversation.
“That’s obnoxious.” He looks at the space where the man had been moments earlier, then back at me. “Do you think you’ll sit with him for an interview?”
“Azar!”
“I know! But that’s Logan Wilson . He’s practically a celebrity. You know that profile about Brad D’Angelo, the reclusive tech guru, that came out last month? That was him! Even I read it.” He laughs at the side-eye I shoot him. “Okay, okay, if not a profile with him, maybe a piece somewhere else? A quick Q and A? You have your pick, don’t you? Answer their questions about the mysterious Nura Khan, and people will finally move on.”
“I may have to, sooner or later. But not with him. He was completely full of himself.”
“I understand.” He lifts my hand and kisses it. “Only a suggestion, my dear fiancée.”
My skin tingles where his lips pressed against it. He plays the part of loving fiancé so well. Too well. Sometimes I can forget it’s all pretend. Sometimes, like now, with our shoulders brushing as we walk back to the mehndi hall, admiring the appetizers the caterers are hurriedly setting up, I want to take his hand in mine. Draw him closer…And just as quickly, my mind flashes back to that night at Emory. The way he’d pulled back when I leaned forward. The mortification spreading across his face. That split second of terror coursing through me that I’d lost my best friend and there would be no fixing it. Instantly, all such thoughts disintegrate. I did lose him. For nearly seven years. I’ll never risk losing him again.
“Looks like the appetizer line is opening,” Azar says.
“I’m famished.” I flush, grateful for the distraction.
I grab a bite-sized samosa and masala shrimp. I arrived an hour late, as is proper protocol for a desi event, but now it’s nearly two hours past the official start time. I’ll need to settle in for an especially long night ahead.
When we sit down at our table, I take a bite of the shrimp and quickly grab a glass of water. “This has got a kick to it. How was the samosa?”
He doesn’t reply. He’s looking over my shoulder. Following his gaze, I see a slim desi woman in a silk sari approach our table.
“Dr. Shah?” She smiles at him, then quizzically at me.
“Halima, this is Nura—my childhood friend. She’s the matchmaker behind the nuptials this evening,” Azar quickly says. “Nura, Halima is the best nurse on the face of the earth, bar none.”
They talk for a few more moments. When she leaves, I tap his elbow. “That’s a first, running into someone you know. I’m kind of surprised it hasn’t happened before.”
Azar doesn’t reply. He studies his uneaten food.
“Azar? What’s wrong?”
He takes a deep breath, then looks at me. “I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep being your pretend fiancé.”
“You told her we were friends.” I give him a funny look. “I’ve never explicitly told anyone we’re engaged; your presence just wards off the inevitable questions.”
“It’s not that. I’m just thinking…. At a certain point, we have to stop this, right? I mean, how do I explain this to someone?”
How do I explain this to someone? Tiny fireballs of terror go off inside of me.
“Are you…are you seeing someone?”
I wait for him to laugh. Mr. Hasn’t Ever Been on More Than Two Dates with the Same Woman. But he’s not laughing. He’s fidgeting.
“I wouldn’t say I’m seeing her. It’s only been a few weeks. It just got me thinking, you know?”
A few weeks. My insides feel like they’re seizing up.
“Do I know her?”
“Her name is Zayna.”
“She works with you, right?”
He nods. I think back to the little Azar has told me about her. She joined his ER a few months ago. Which means Halima will likely be telling her all about running into the two of us at this wedding.
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” I ask.
“There’s nothing to tell.” He shrugs. “It’s all really new.”
A few weeks isn’t new. Not when it comes to Azar. Besides, they work together. They’ve known each other even longer. I take in a deep breath to steady myself, but this sensation passing through me—it’s like I’m free-falling.
“I—I’m glad you’re hitting it off with Zayna,” I finally say. “She won’t mind your being my plus-one to weddings, will she?”
“I have such little free time as it is, it just doesn’t feel fair to her.” He shakes his head. “I’ll be thirty-three this November. We can’t keep doing this forever.”
Somewhere deep down I had to know this would eventually happen. That there would come a moment when he’d find someone. Fall in love. I should count myself lucky we’ve lasted as long as we have. There’s no partner in the world who would be okay with her boyfriend spending every weekend going to weddings with another woman. There probably aren’t very many who would be okay with our friendship at all.
He searches my eyes for a reaction. I swallow. All those years ago at Emory, I blamed our near kiss on sleep deprivation from a week of pulling all-nighters. Or the hookah we’d snagged from his roommate, passing it back and forth while we sat on his bed watching our favorite survival show, Wild. He’d just told me he’d gotten into NYU medical school moments earlier, and the news was still sinking in. We’d known each other forever. We’d been in and out of each other’s homes growing up. Hanging out at the creaky kitchen table at Khala’s. Or the overstuffed leather sofas in his family room, the scent of his mother’s potato parathas wafting over to us. Through college, it had been a new setting but the same Nura and Azar. We were in and out of each other’s routines. We were each other’s routines. That night, it had hit me: Come August, he’d be gone. That night, I’d taken in the heart-shaped curve of his mouth. The stubble against his jaw. I’d leaned forward. A sudden desire to hold on to him. To be with him. I’d realized a truth so real it had taken my breath away: I loved him. I remember how he recoiled. He’d looked at me like a rabbit caught in a snare. Desperate to undo the damage I feared I’d done, I’d rolled my eyes and laughed. Teased him for his stunned expression. Then I’d begged him to pretend it never happened. Turns out, though, you can’t pretend a moment like that away. We kept in touch over the years—phone calls on birthdays, memes texted back and forth—but it was never the same again. It took years, until he moved back to Atlanta and we officially cleared the air, to put the past behind us. I’ve moved on. I completely accept that we’re just friends. But he was always meant to be a friend I would lose, wasn’t he? Sure, we will always know each other. I’ll attend his children’s birthday parties. Send gifts on holidays. But it won’t be the same. These days of easy togetherness are numbered.
I clear my throat. I know I’m jumping to a million conclusions. Who knows what’ll happen between him and Zayna, though the fact that she’s outlasted every woman who came before her tells me things are more serious than he’s letting on. Still, I’ll be his friend as long as I can. And I’m going to find out everything there is to know about Dr. Zayna Chaudhry. My best friend’s love interest warrants a healthy perusal to make sure everything checks out, doesn’t she? Azar deserves the best.
From my peripheral vision I see the mother of the bride heading toward me.
Good. A distraction. Except—
As she grows closer, I realize she’s not walking so much as she’s marching toward me. Her sari is bunched in one hand. Her eyes are swollen and puffy.
I jump out of my seat and hurry toward her. “What’s going on? What’s the matter?”
Her response tilts my world completely off its axis:
“The wedding is off.”