by Sonya Lalli
They are a break from her sometimes sixteen-hour workdays, a splash of color onto what would otherwise be a life walled in by the dreary, pale demands of working in the City of London. The girls introduce her to the real city—gigs outside Zone 1, wine bars in repurposed churches—and also to the boys they know. Immature, ashy brown–haired boys who find her witty when drunk, intimidating when sober. To them, Raina downplays her job at the investment bank, her life among the three-thousand-pound suits marching up and down Cheapside and Cannon Street. She was chosen from among fifty applicants in the Toronto, New York, and Chicago offices for a temporary transfer to the overseas office, but these aren’t the things that interest them.
Nor do they interest her.
His name is Dev Singh, and at present, he is a mere silhouette.
They have never spoken directly, yet two months earlier, at her very first meeting, it was his voice she noticed first. The way he gently commands a boardroom, she can tell he’s humble. Dedicated. He’s a man unaware of his impact on others, and this only affects her more.
They still haven’t spoken directly, yet she’s conscious of him always. How she is slightly taller than him in heels, or the way he crosses and uncrosses his legs when he has something to say. How he stays at the office later than most people—even Fridays, never joining the rest of them at the pub. Already, he is unlike any man she has ever met. He is more than the men she talks to at clubs through gritted teeth, her flatmates giggling nearby. The ones in the cash-only line at Tesco. Already, he’s more than either of her college boyfriends, flings so brief, inconsequential, she often forgets she had them. She is startled by the way Dev affects her. She has never been attracted to an Indian man before, and this is how she knows it must be real. She knows that Dev is different.
She has already given up hope that he might turn up to the pub that evening, when she sees him. Her heart pounds. She stiffens as he walks past her, and slyly, she leans back in her chair and looks after him.
He is greeted with enthusiasm by a cluster of bankers—those more senior, sitting separate from her crowd. He leans forward against the backs of two chairs, and she struggles to hear what they are saying over the chatter, over Colin, who again asks if she’d like another pint. Dev says something she misses, and it makes the group laugh, especially the woman—Becky—who heads the fixed-income division. She throws her head back as she laughs, and the blond hairs of her ponytail catch on his suit.
Raina has never liked Becky.
After a moment, Dev turns and walks toward the bar. Raina exhales. This is it, she tells herself. Today is her birthday, and unlike any other day, she is sure that this time she will think of something to say. Witty. Original—though not overly curated. She has been waiting for a chance to approach him. To impress him. And somehow, she knows that now is the time. She counts to five before following, and as she slinks toward him, navigates through the after-work crowd, her mind once again draws a blank. Her stomach churns. She is only a few feet away, and she is considering turning back, when he looks over his shoulder and smiles.
“Ah.” He leans back on the counter. “Raina Anand. Our newest import from Ca-nada.”
She is giddy about the fact he knows her name and bites her lip to keep from smiling. She loves how he says “Canada,” and her country suddenly appears elegant in her mind. She struggles not to picture him there with her, already; running to catch the streetcar on King Street, handing Nani a bouquet of wildflowers the first time he comes for dinner.
“That’s me.”
“I’ve been meaning to swing by and chat, but—”
“But you’re a busy man,” she says, surprised by the evenness of her voice.
“Too busy, it would seem.” He is looking at her neck. Her lips. Her hair in wisps around her shoulders. “So,” he says, sliding a beer toward her. “What can you tell me then, Raina?”
She smiles coyly and reaches for the beer. As she had hoped, she knows exactly what to say.
* * *
They stand there for hours. She is dizzy from the smell of his cologne, the glasses of hefeweizen that keep appearing in front her. They are speaking, and at times, she has no idea what about—redemption funds and Chelsea football. The pub’s fresco-style ceiling. She has never laughed so hard, been so inebriated by another human being. He is teasing her. Enveloping her. He pinches her nose, and his thumb falls slowly, parting her lips. And suddenly, they are no longer laughing.
He grabs her hand and leads her outside. Beneath the moony streets of St. Paul’s, she reminds herself that she’s not supposed to believe in casual sex. But the way Dev is kissing her, his fingers lightly wound through her hair, already this doesn’t feel casual. Minutes pass, and then he pulls away and tilts her chin to the side. She looks up at him and cannot meet his eye, and she prepares herself to say no when he inevitably asks her to go home with him. But he doesn’t ask. Instead, he thumbs the leather of her purse, wonders out loud whether she happens to have her passport.
His hand stays on her knee in the taxi as they head north on Farringdon Road toward St. Pancras station. Their wide smiles fill the back seat, and he apologizes three, four, five times, telling her that Paris would have been more romantic, more fitting for birthday spontaneity—if only the Eurostar to Paris wasn’t already booked up. Brussels is perfect, she says into his shoulder. Raina has never been to Brussels, and she senses now that she’d always wanted to go.
He buys them orange juice and chicken avocado sandwiches in the cafeteria car, and as they dip beneath the English Channel, her ears pop and he tells her about growing up in West Harrow. She senses his shame as he talks about his family. She doesn’t understand his resentment, but she intertwines her fingers with his and tells him that she does.
It is nearly midnight by the time they reach Gare de Bruxelles-Midi, and after hailing a taxi, Dev looks surprised when Raina begins to converse with the driver, asks him in stilted French to take them anywhere he likes. He drops them off on a lively street across from La Grand-Place. Brass lampposts and cobblestone streets, twinkle lights and fogged-in windows. Hundreds of men stripped down to their boxers parading through the square, whipping their red, sweat-drenched football shirts around like batons, chanting, “Allez la Belgique!”
Dev squeezes her hand as they maneuver through the crowd and onto quieter lanes. They are soon lost, and everything smells of white wine and rain. They wander past marble fountains, through alleys and impossibly green parks, and every so often, he pulls her aside—against a railing or black brick wall—and kisses her. Every time, she falls further. Becomes more convinced about the connection between them. That rushing sensation. The inability to catch her breath. And right there, on the darkened streets of Brussels, for the first time, Raina falls in love.
It’s nearly dawn when they find a hotel. Dev leads her to the room, and her mind races. Her body trembles. She’s twenty-five now, and a virgin. Isn’t she ready?
Wasn’t she waiting for this?
She sits on the foot of the bed, and Dev kneels down in front of her. Kisses both of her knees. And then he reaches up and kisses her, pulls down her face to his, and she’s on the floor, too, pressed hard against him.
Nani’s face flashes before her eyes, and then her mother’s. Every time this is what has happened, and every time it’s the reason she stopped.
She thinks about pushing Dev away, ending it before she becomes weak—before she becomes her mother. But he’s kissing her neck, her collarbone. His tongue darts in and out of her ear, and then her mouth—and then it is consuming her. His hands around her waist, Dev lifts her to the bed, pushes her down. Raina’s blouse, Dev’s trousers are flung to the side, and with them her doubts. With Dev, she’s alive, finally, and nothing can stop her.
DATE #3
I followed Arjun’s eyes, which were glued to a chubby-cheeked Asian toddler with a Spider-Man hoodie and chocolate on his
face. He was perched on the shoulders of his dad, yawning and at the same time attempting to have another lick of his ice cream cone.
“Adorable.” Arjun squeezed my forearm. I tried not to flinch. “Isn’t he just the cutest?”
“Very cute,” I admitted, subtly drawing my arm back. What had Nani written on that list, which was now buried somewhere at the bottom of my handbag? Arjun was a pediatrician, so he probably wanted to have kids soon? She wasn’t kidding. Arjun and I had been at Canada’s Wonderland for several hours, and he’d already pointed out a dozen children to me. All of them Asian. All of them spitting images of him. Gulp, or me.
“Do you have any nieces or nephews?” He hesitated, probably realizing I’d already told him I was an only child. “Or small cousins?”
I shook my head, as we shuffled forward in line for the park’s largest roller coaster. “My experience with children is limited.”
“Ah.”
“But I like kids of course.” I attempted a smile. “You know, my friend Shay and her fiancé are both pediatricians, too.”
“Oh, Shaylee Patel? Yes, I’m sure I’ve met her.” The roller coaster sped over us, and Arjun rubbed his hands together in delight. “I’m so excited! This one’s my favorite.”
“I’ve never been to Wonderland.”
“No?” Arjun smiled at me, and then rested his hand gently on my shoulder. “Clearly, no one’s ever spoiled you before.”
The line trudged forward, and the optimism I’d embraced at the beginning of the date waned. After Shay had scolded me for overreacting with Sachin, never mind getting plain drunk on a first date, I decided I needed to try anew. Try to make an effort with the men Nani had selected. And so when both Arjun and Jayesh asked me if I had plans the following Saturday, I cleared my calendar and tossed a coin.
Heads for Arjun.
He was lovelier in person than he was via text message. Respectful. Sweet. Fun. Attractive. He’d mentioned in passing that he’d broken up with a long-term girlfriend just months before, and I knew this sort of guy wouldn’t be single for long. Everything about Arjun seemed suitable, and appropriate, but as the attendants buckled us into the ride, it struck me that I was entirely bored. Not bored with him, but with myself. Who exactly was I pretending to be meeting him? A nice Indian girl devoted to her nani? A hardworking investment analyst with high-flying ambitions—that is, until she became the mother of our adorably South Asian babies?
Arjun wanted to marry a woman like the character I was playing. He wouldn’t want the real me, and by the end of the dizzying ride, I was confident that I didn’t want to play that role for him, either.
When we parted ways in the parking garage, I let him down gently. Afterward, I fished the list out of my purse, found a pen in the glove box, and crossed out his name. Sure, maybe there wouldn’t be anybody on this list that was more right for me than Arjun, but I knew I was doing him a favor. There was bound to be an amazing woman on Arjun’s own list who’d feel lucky to have him.
Arjun—Sonia’s son, pediatrician, probably will want to have babies soon!
Has B-A-B-Y fever!
FIVE
The clear blue skies of summer continued. The bodies of Bay Street moved at a slower pace, stilled by the humidity, the souring heat coming off the Great Lakes. Summer had always meant studying and taking temp jobs at the library or as a research assistant. Coaching community basketball. Now, summer blended into the rest of the year.
My job felt stagnant, even mindless, and at least twice a day I’d find myself lying on my keyboard staring sideways at a pile of papers, eyes blurred, until one of the senior bankers’ voices in the hallway startled me upright. When I was dating Dev, I’d loved my job. Or had I? He’d traveled abroad for work every few days or weeks, and when he was in London, we both spent most of our waking hours in the office. But we’d been happy. We’d made it work, although I had no idea how. London felt so long ago, and a heavy fog seemed to block me from remembering the details.
I broke up the summer monotony as best I could. There were rooftop bars or music festivals with colleagues after work; midnight movies alone at the cheap theater near my condo; short weekends away at a cottage with Zoey and Alice—now back together “for good”—and other friends, complete with chopped logs and icy beer, sunbaked split ends and aloe vera for the drive home. And, of course, there were my morning breakfasts with Shay—although because of the wedding plans and conflicting work schedules, I saw her less and less. When we did see each other, she was distracted by the latest wedding crisis, and I’d get snappy at the mention of Auntie Sarla or Nani, and one of us would end up making an excuse to leave early. Because Nani had been a young grandmother, and Sarla had had Shay in her early thirties, the two women were close in age—and “close competitors.” Seemingly, all they wanted to talk about these days was Shay’s impending nuptials, and the fact that mine were still TBD.
I thought I was making progress on the list—although, according to Nani, two first dates that didn’t turn into first husbands didn’t count as progress. Sachin was a tool. Vishal wasn’t single. Arjun was—well, not the one. I went to Nani’s house after leaving Wonderland, and after I had made up excuses about how Arjun and I weren’t a good match, she squished up her face as if she’d stuck a lemon beneath her tongue, and said, “Not him, too?” Nani was young enough to be my mother, but the generation between us could feel endless. Raising my mother, raising me, had made Nani modern quickly. Unwillingly. But she still couldn’t understand that women no longer needed to get married.
Was that unfair of me? Hadn’t I wanted to get married? Fulfill every fantasy and stereotype? How many hours had I wasted wondering when Dev would propose, envisioning garlands of marigolds and traditional saris, silk drapery and bhangra music. Dev in a kurta pajama, and everyone in my family—for the first time—sitting peacefully in the same room.
* * *
One Sunday in late August, the first day in over a month where I had the option to sleep in, Nani insisted I come home and spend the day with her. I relinquished my plans of sleeping off my hangover, of spending the day on the balcony with a tub of ice cream and the book I’d been meaning to read for over a year, and instead, Nani and I made paratha.
It had been years since I’d helped her in the kitchen, and I was proud of the result. Parathas, gold and flaky, smothered in butter, stuffed with spicy aloo. After, we ate them beneath the backyard awning, cooling ourselves down in the lazy summer breeze. Nani had slipped a disk in her back the summer before, and I’d hired a neighbor’s son to mow the lawn, to trim the hedges and plant, while Nani pointed and prodded, sat on a stool as she instructed him on how she wanted the beds arranged.
“Andy’s doing a good job with the yard,” I said, yawning, admiring the lawn, almost a forest green.
“What is that?” She reached forward and pulled at my ear, and then squinted at the blue paint that rubbed off onto her fingers. “Paint?”
“Um, yes?”
“Vhy? Are you renovating your apartment? This is not a good color.”
“No. I went to a—uh—pride party last night.” I thought back to the evening before—Zoey, Alice, me, and some of our other friends bodysurfing, drunk off electronica music at a warehouse in the Gay Village—and decided to leave out the details.
“Pride?” she asked after a moment.
“Like, you know”—I hesitated—“a celebration for LGBTQ—”
“Huh?”
“For gay people, Nani. It was a party celebrating gay people,” I said, trying to rack my brain for the most straightforward way of explaining the term. “I went with my friends. With Zoey—you remember her, right?”
“Oh. Was Ellen there?”
“Ellen DeGeneres lives in Los Angeles.”
“But I thought you said you were too busy this weekend to see Jayesh. His mother is calling me many times.”
“I was busy,” I grumbled, refusing to feel guilty about the fact I kept postponing my date with Jayesh. “I was at the party.”
“Raina . . .” She clucked her tongue. “You are pushing luck—just like your mother used to. Please try. Jayesh comes from very good Hindu family.”
“So he’s automatically perfect for me?”
“I am not a silly woman.” Nani sighed, and turned to face the lawn. “His family is very educated, very stable. These things become important in raising children. Values are important.”
“Being Hindu. Being . . . Indian.” I buried my toes into the dirt in front of me, twisted them in the damp earth. “Is that what’s important to you?”
“Nah, Raina. Julien is Catholic, he is white—and look, your Auntie Sarla is fine with it. Please just stop looking for things that are wrong. They are men. White, brown, yellow, blue; they all have something wrong with them.” Nani guffawed. “Just pick one!”
I knew she was trying to be funny, and so I laughed. But I had picked one—and in the end, Dev wasn’t ready to get married. Did that mean I should just pick another now? One that I liked well enough, and one day could maybe fall in love with?
I watched the geraniums shudder as the sun grew fierce. I checked my watch. It was nearly noon, and our temple’s Sunday service usually went until 1 P.M.
“Nani, you want to go to the mandir?”
“Aacha?” Nani smiled, and sitting forward on the lawn chair, she squeezed my chin. “Okay, let us go.”
Our temple, all limestone and Mughal-influenced architecture, was only a ten-minute drive away. It sat at the edge of a public park, its grounds clean lines of lawn and concrete. The puja was already under way as Nani and I walked in. The front altar was decorated with tin bells and displays of fruit and sweets, rose petals, shiny jewelry, and garlands strung of marigolds. Nani maneuvered her way through the crowd toward the front where she always sat with Auntie Sarla, and I lingered near the back searching for space on the crowded floor.