PART 1 #3
‘Aditya’s the handsomest guy I have ever met,’ says Vanita out of the blue, as if to explain this ridiculous wedding.
I have seen their pictures. Vanita looks like the hot young sister of an uncle-ish-looking boy who works in LIC or some equally drab job.
‘He’s three inches shorter than you are and has a moustache,’ I remind her. ‘Hardly someone you would throw away your life for.’
‘Aditya has a big, veiny dick three inches too long, loves me and loves his job.’
I stare her down.
She continues her defence, ‘And stop saying I’m throwing my life away! I want to give five years to family, have two kids quickly, then get back into corporate life.’
‘I’m trying to imagine a company that would want a mother with no experience and two kids, and that company doesn’t exist. This is professional hara-kiri.’
Vanita shrugs as if different rules apply to her. ‘We will see about that,’ she challenges. ‘And if you have such a clear view of the future, where will you be after five years?’
‘I could be anywhere, I could do anything. That’s the best part about not getting married to some random guy,’ I answer. ‘One thing I know for sure, I don’t want to change diapers and wait for a guy to come home to give me some attention and then crib to me about how difficult his work is.’
Vanita looks at me and smiles as if she knows some secret about life that I don’t. Every person about to make a very stupid decision thinks they have cracked it.
‘I want precisely that. Every word of what you just said. I want to hear him complain. I want to crib to him about our kids whom we will call Ariana or some fancy-ass name like that. I want to talk about his work, gossip about someone in his office or my friends’ circle, watch a Netflix show and then go to sleep.
I want us to plan family trips, and then scream at him for not having packed enough chargers, and listen to him yell at me for letting the kids play in the water for too long.
We will grow fat, hate our bodies, and then grow thin again.
We will give each other love and anxiety and sadness and anger issues.
We will want to kill each other but also love each other to death. ’
Her idea of her future makes my skin crawl. I always saw Vanita as a globe-trotting, joke-cracking, dance-floor-tearing-up CEO.
‘How can you want that? It sounds like you want to put your hand into a blender because you like the colour red!’
‘How can you want to be a VP in Singapore? Or the US? Or Australia?’ she snaps back. ‘It’s like god gave you seven billion people and you choose to be alone.’
It’s a faulty argument. I have people for everything—Kanika to go watch movies with, Rajat for general hangouts, Smita for shopping and Arunima for window shopping. Why would I want only one person to do everything with me?
‘You’re going to regret it,’ I warn her. ‘When you’re forty and you realize your kids are spoilt teenagers who never look up from their screens and snap at you for being uncool, when your husband thinks you’re no longer hot, you’re going to want to go back and change everything.’
Vanita looks at me, horrified. ‘You think I won’t be hot at forty? C’mon.’
‘That part I got wrong.’
We have been through this argument before, and it ends exactly where we started. In disagreement. And the changing of topics.
I check the time. ‘Another hour and Gaurav will land. To be honest, I’m way more excited about the clothes he’s getting me than your wedding.’
Vanita’s eyes light up hearing about my clothes. I am wearing Satya Paul, Sabyasachi and Manish Malhotra for the wedding. Gaurav, my stupid but famous brother, made that happen.
‘All of Aditya’s friends will die looking at you!’ chirps Vanita. ‘I can’t believe you’re going to wear better clothes than I will at my wedding. That’s like stabbing me in the back and then twisting the knife for good measure.’
If it were any other bride, she would have taken offence, but not Vanita. She’s too cool, too tall, too fit, too in love with herself to have a ranking system.
‘Why aren’t you my size?’ she fake-complains and exhales deeply. ‘Should have got married to Gaurav, then I would be leveraging his contacts.’
‘I’m surprised he’s even coming to the wedding,’ I confess.
‘That dumbo has watched too many movies and is expecting you to cancel the wedding at the last moment and run away with him. You should have seen how much he cried when you announced the wedding. He cursed me as if it was my job to make you fall in love with him.’
She chuckles. ‘Cute. But well, at least he’s famous. He’s coming alone, right? Daksh is not coming.’
This morning when Gaurav had confirmed that he would arrive solo, a wave of relief washed over me.
The mere thought of facing Daksh one more time had filled me with dread, and I had become consumed by the fear that he would somehow ruin my dear friend’s wedding.
In my desperation, I resorted to my tried-and-tested coping mechanism.
Days ago, I had scrawled ‘Jai Shree Ram’ on to my palm, determined not to let it fade until I received word that he wouldn’t be attending.
‘Thank God he’s not coming,’ I say.
‘He’s much better than that Rajat guy. And don’t give me that nonsense that he’s your best friend or whatever,’ grouses Vanita. ‘Two people who have had sex can never be friends.’
I open the second can of gin. I can sense the beginnings of tipsiness in my body. Vanita can believe that two people who have known each other for only six months can get married and spend the next fifty years together, but people can’t be friends after having sex for a total of six times.
‘How many times do I have to tell you that Rajat has a girlfriend? Nandini,’ I tell her irritably.
Vanita swats me away like I’m some housefly buzzing around her ears. ‘One has to be blind not to see how much he’s into you. For the last time, Aanchal, one can’t be friends with people they have had sex with.’
‘Rajat’s going to marry Nandini. He’s just looking for the right opportunity to ask her.’
Rajat’s decision is more prudent than Vanita’s.
Nandini, already twenty-eight, feels the weight of her parents’ concern as she approaches the dreaded age for Indian women.
Both Rajat and Nandini boast of an IIT education and successful careers in software, comfortably situated within the same social sphere.
Unlike Vanita, neither of them has to sacrifice their ambitions in the name of matrimony.
Vanita’s not convinced. ‘Even if they find Nandini and Rajat’s skeletons cuddling in their grave centuries from now, I’d still know he’s head over heels in love with you. I bet he’s picturing you when he’s deep inside Nandini.’
‘I think you’re jealous that I have a best friend besides you.’
‘I’m jealous, but I’m also sad for him.’
‘Be sad for yourself. Putting all your eggs in one basket,’ I remark.
‘Technically, he will be putting something of his into a basket of my eggs.’
‘. . .’
‘My uterus, my eggs, he will be putting—’
‘I got what you’re saying!’
‘I’m in love, Aanchal. You wouldn’t know.’
I let out an exasperated sigh, my eyes rolling so far back that my pupils seem to penetrate my cerebrum. ‘Been there, absolutely not recommended. Love is a trap.’
‘Keep believing that and one day you will end up alone and lonely.’
‘People can be in marriages, in relationships, and still be lonely. At least I will only blame myself. Anyway, I would have my best friend with me,’ I say and put my arm around her. ‘Who will be so sick and tired of her husband and spoilt kids, she would spend all her time with me. But . . .’
‘But?’
‘You will have to get a US visa for it.’
‘What?’
‘It’s true,’ I say. ‘Just got the employment letter last week.’
‘Don’t tell me!’ Vanita clasps her hands around her mouth. Then throws her arms around me. ‘Bottoms up for that! Wow! I love you! I’m so happy for you!’
4.
Aanchal Madan
Vanita drives into the porch of the ridiculously huge and needlessly opulent Atlantis, Dubai.
The ocean-themed resort—made in the colours of sand and perched right on the beach—is teeming with people prancing around in all states of dress and undress.
The last I checked online, all of the resort’s 1544 rooms were booked.
Which corroborated my point about Vanita’s peak-season destination wedding.
Such a waste.
Aditya’s waiting for us, a bright smile playing on his lips. Aditya oozes warmth and charisma, that much is clear. He whisks my suitcase away from me. He informs me that when Maa–Papa come, they will be given the room next to me, and that he’s eager to introduce me to his gang.
‘We are all waiting for your brother too,’ Aditya says excitedly. ‘We have a PlayStation hooked up in one of the rooms. We are hoping he will teach us some of his tricks in FIFA.’
‘No one cares about my wedding apparently,’ complains Vanita.
I have always felt strange about people coming to me with requests to meet Gaurav. His fan meets and greets are bonkers. Hundreds of people mob him. He ends up signing everything from gaming controllers to T-shirts to people’s arms.
‘I can never get used to people thinking that Gaurav’s anything but a bumbling idiot,’ I tell Aditya.
Aditya brushes me away as if he knows my brother better than I do. ‘He’s a star!’ Aditya insists. ‘His gameplay is incredible.’
‘If you ask your fiancée, she will tell you that Gaurav has absolutely no game.’
Vanita chuckles.
‘If I were Vanita,’ muses Aditya. ‘I would get married to Gaurav a hundred times over instead. Can you imagine being married to someone who games for a living?’
‘You can still do that,’ butts in Vanita. ‘He’s coming, shoot your shot.’
Aditya is relentless in his fanboying. ‘But it’s not just his gameplay, which is legit out of this world. He’s a funny guy. Quite sharp.’