Chapter 5 Party Games #2
Too soon, we pull onto the street. The houses in this neighborhood are massive, too big to be comfortably filled by the four- or five-person desi families who live here, but great for a party.
All the BMWs and Teslas have filled the nearby parking, so we park farther and walk through the old, iced-over snow.
I mentally prepare myself as we trudge forward, reminded by the cars that these people are deeply conservative.
Plenty of them want to stop immigration—from India too!
—in order to give their children an advantage, believe in Muslim bans, think Black people don’t work hard enough, and worship money.
Maybe not everyone, but enough of them that I am always on guard.
There’s a crush of people inside. Too many, but at least it’s warm. I scan the crowd, hoping to find an acquaintance to stand next to—perfect Shreya Pillai, perhaps, or the recently engaged Apoorva Sangvi—but come up empty.
“Neha!” a woman my mom’s age calls out, beckoning Aai over. A young man stands next to her.
We’ve barely even slipped off our shoes, and the game begins.
This is why I avoid desi gatherings like the plague.
These large, impersonal events are all report-card and bank-account competition all the time.
I’m twenty-six years old, and people want to know my SAT score.
I recognize the moment in which everyone else notices that Rima Aunty is with us, because there’s a hush of silence followed by extremely forced conversation.
The woman who called out to Aai withdraws her hand from the air, but Aai sets her jaw and moves toward her with me in tow.
Over my shoulder I see Rima Aunty bulldozing her way toward Kamala Aunty, a fast friend of hers, or at least, a fast friend of hers twenty-four hours ago.
Aai says, “This is Sheetal. Sheetal, meet my daughter, Nisha.”
Sheetal Aunty gives me a once-over, then says, “Have you met my son?”
Aai barely hides her eye roll as Sheetal Aunty pushes her son forward. I prepare myself for the forthcoming dick-measuring contest—mine’s bigger, not that anybody cares. “Ishaan went to Northwestern! He’s a consultant.”
Well, that’s a job title that makes me want to choke on my own vomit. I hope I’ve managed to smile rather than grimace. “Cool.”
“He’s very smart,” Sheetal Aunty continues. “He got a 1500 on his SAT and works for a Big Five consulting firm, Parthenon. Where did your daughter go? Where does she work?”
“Nisha went to the University of Chicago,” Aai says. “She works at a health center.”
Sheetal Aunty’s eyes light up. “I think it’s wonderful when kids go to the public city schools and save money, especially to work in medicine.
” Translation: I’m not threatening to her precious son’s prestige, but I’ll bring in a good income.
These aunties only hear what they want to hear.
Aai’s eyes dart toward me in warning, but I stay silent. I have no pride to protect anymore.
Ishaan says, “She means UChicago, Amma. The number three school in the country.”
Sheetal Aunty gives a small, insipid laugh. “Even better!”
“Nisha doesn’t work in medicine,” Aai breaks in. I’m thankful. Hopefully it will make me less appealing, so I can move on.
“Oh? What do you do?” Ishaan asks. In a surprise twist, he’s actually addressed the question to me. I almost feel a little bad for him, because he doesn’t know what most people in the community already do, that no self-respecting family would want me to be a part of theirs.
“It’s a small clinic, so I wear a lot of hats. I do outreach to local organizations, manage volunteers, and sometimes counsel patients.” Simple, clean. I’m not ashamed of what I do, but I’d rather avoid drama.
“What kind of medical clinic has volunteers? You mean students?” Sheetal Aunty asks.
It’s obvious from her tone that she’s annoyed at us, probably for the semipublic correction issued by her own son.
This kind of tone always ticks off Aai. For all her talk about wanting me to control my temper, I had to learn it from somewhere.
“An abortion clinic,” Aai says with a sharp smile.
The effect on Sheetal Aunty is immediate. She wrinkles her nose and takes a step back. “That’s… nice,” she says, before adding sotto voce, “But don’t you want your daughter doing cleaner work?”
Disappointingly, Ishaan looks like he agrees. I look around the crowded room—sometimes Geeta, the owner of our clinic, happens to be at these things. I see her more at parties than at the clinic, since she embraces a hands-off role.
Something in Aai snaps. “Cleaner how? Do you really divide work that way, Sheetal?”
Sheetal Aunty opens and closes her mouth, then looks at a point behind us, before offering a cruel smile.
“Rima’s the expert. She says that this abortion business is contrary to Hinduism.
” She whispers the word abortion as though she doesn’t want to be caught saying it.
Both Aai and I whirl around to face Rima Aunty, who is wearing a guilty expression.
“Well, I didn’t say that, exactly,” she whispers in a meek tone of voice I haven’t heard from her before.
“Hinduism is a very scientific religion,” proclaims a male voice out of nowhere.
I think it might be Dr. Bhat, which would be an absurd development.
“The medical consensus is that we cannot consider a fetus to be independent life until viability. Our religion teaches that we must minimize harm, and what is abortion if not respecting someone’s choice to minimize harm for themselves? ”
It is Dr. Bhat. That man has said maybe ten words in public in the whole time we’ve known him, and now he’s participating in discourse about abortion and Hinduism? Everyone else seems equally shocked, so he gives a little shrug and disappears into the kitchen. I pinch myself.
“Did that just happen?” I whisper to Aai.
“I didn’t know he could do that,” she responds, her voice so soft that I can barely hear her. She may be talking to herself. The circle of people around us disperses, and a few people pat me on the back before wandering far, far away from the toxic huddle I seem to be stuck in.
“Where’s Ajay?” Sheetal Aunty asks Rima Aunty, as though inquiring about the weather.
“Oh, Ajay texted me earlier,” Kamala Aunty says, sidling up to us. “He says not to worry about him, that he was only worried about you, my dear. He said you’re going through a hard time, and you need friends.”
Two spots of color rise on Rima Aunty’s cheeks. “I’m not some sort of imbecile,” she snaps.
“Control yourself,” Kamala Aunty orders, as though speaking to a child. “Bhagwan only knows we’ve all been on the bad end of your tongue. Ajay is worried about you! Most of us would love a husband who shows such concern.”
With each passing moment, Rima Aunty seems to retreat further into herself, her whole face suffused with maroon. “I—he—you don’t understand—”
“My cousin’s daughter had some… instability, you know how kids these days are,” Sheetal Aunty says.
“And she had to get a therapist. I will get you the name. We all want you to get well, Rima.” She gives Rima Aunty a condescending pat on the hand, then leaves the three of us alone.
Our radioactivity might be making us glow.
Rima Aunty takes a deep breath, and then turns to me. “I was perhaps a bit harsh in how I have spoken about you. I had to, you understand?”
A bit of me is repulsed. At a detached level, I recognize in myself a classic cognitive dissonance.
I know that victims of abuse may exhibit signs of childishness or immaturity, and act in manipulative ways in order to get the support they so desperately need.
Hell, I’ve seen it at the clinic when I have to fill in to counsel patients on their options.
But those patients haven’t hurt me. Rima Aunty has.
After the day I’ve had, the desire to hurt her back is brewing within me. Part of me wants to lash out, call her a pathetic liar. An evil in my chest warms at the idea, and I do my best to ice it out. “An apology would be a nice start,” I say.
“I’m sorry,” she says.
She’s given me what I want, and still I can’t bring myself to forgive her.
Aai reaches behind me and pinches my hip.
“All right.” Her face brightens, even though I’ve given her the most noncommittal response possible.
I turn away in disgust, both at her and at myself.
If people want to talk shit about me, well, maybe I deserve it.