Grown-Up Pose

by Sonya Lalli

  “I found the recipe in Nigella Lawson’s book.” He gestured to the top of the fridge, and she followed with her eyes. There was a stack of books—all Western food or fusion—none of which would be Priya’s. “I’m good at pastas now, salads, casseroles, stir-fries. That sort of thing.” He chuckled. “I haven’t worked up the courage to try cooking Indian food yet.”

  He reached for the chopping board and then a large chef’s knife and started chopping basil. With each downward fall of the knife, it hit her. Neil was cooking.

  He was taking care of Priya and running a household.

  He was doing it right there in front of her, and still she couldn’t believe it.

  “Could you pass me the ricotta?” He looked up and smiled, although he was not meeting her eyes. “It’s in the fridge.”

  Nodding, she fetched the ricotta. The fridge was stocked, mostly with healthy food, and the top shelf was lined with the craft IPA Neil liked. The sight of it—the graffiti-like design, the lime green stripe—made Anu so sad, she almost dropped the cheese.

  “Thanks,” he said after she handed it to him.

  She had assumed that it was Auntie Jayani and Priya’s battalion of friends on roll call who had been feeding her and Neil, taking care of their house, that he had left his job to be there for emotional support rather than for anything else.

  Who was this man standing in front of her?

  Abruptly he set down the ricotta and pulled out his phone, buzzing now in his hand. “Could you watch the pasta? I’ll be a minute.”

  He went into the dining room, and she tried not to eavesdrop, although just by his tone she could tell he was speaking to her.

  The jealousy grew unbearable, deep and cutting. Anu had married the Neil who hadn’t known yogurt needed to be refrigerated, and this other woman was getting someone entirely different. A man who put effort into his relationship and didn’t become as useless as putty as soon as he got home from work.

  Anu moved around the counter and hovered over the stove. Using a fork, she pulled a piece of pasta out of the boiling water, blew on it, and put it in her mouth.

  Their marriage had never been like this. Sharing. Taking turns. One of them starting the pasta and the other one finishing it.

  Could it have been?

  Neil was back in the kitchen by the time she had drained the pasta and folded in a touch of olive oil. He took over for her, and she retreated from the stove.

  “Sorry about that.”

  “Was that your . . . ?”

  “Yeah.” He set down the wooden spoon and looked right at her. “Her name’s Paula.”

  Paula. So she had a name.

  “I’m happy for you.”

  “Thanks.” He smiled, moved back to the Parmesan. “I haven’t introduced her to Kanika yet—”

  “It’s OK,” she said, cutting him off. “It’s your decision.” Was she relieved? She was relieved, but the word “yet” haunted her.

  I haven’t introduced Kanika to her future stepmother yet.

  I haven’t moved on entirely from you, forgotten the twelve years we spent together—yet.

  The pattern on the fake granite counter top was nauseating, zigging and zagging and spinning out right in front of her. She stared harder.

  “After everything that’s happened, Neil, you deserve to be happy.”

  She was saying the words—she meant the words—but why did it hurt so much?

  “You too, Anu . . . So what happened with Ryan?”

  She winced, crossed her arms in front of her. “Sorry. I meant to tell you we broke up. It’s just with everything going on I . . .”

  She trailed off but quickly realized Neil was still waiting for her to speak.

  “When did you find out?”

  “While you were in London. Tom mentioned it in passing but didn’t give any details.”

  “Right . . .”

  “I didn’t realize things weren’t going well.”

  “Me either . . .” She gave him a look, and Neil’s mouth dropped.

  “No . . .”

  She shrugged. “Unfortunately, yes.”

  “Damn it, Anush. I always knew he was a bastard.”

  Anu snorted. “Apparently everyone did but me.”

  “You trust too easily,” he said, still looking at her.

  And why was that? she wanted to ask him out loud. Because she’d never had a reason not to trust anyone before? Because as inconsiderate and juvenile and mind-numbingly frustrating as Neil could be, he would never, ever have broken her heart?

  The pasta was delicious. He’d always been precise, competent when he was in the mood, and Anu knew he would have followed the recipe to the T. Every so often, Priya would set down her fork to grab his hand, squeeze it, while Kanika talked about the latest move she had learned in dance class or her thoughts on Ariana Grande’s newest single. If Priya remembered telling Anu the truth about Neil’s father, she didn’t show it, and for a while, it was like nothing had changed.

  It was a normal weekday night, and the four of them were eating dinner. Enjoying a quiet family dinner.

  * * *

  • • •

  Later, Anu helped Neil clear the dishes and then disappeared to the bathroom while he warmed brownies in the microwave oven. She flipped down the toilet seat cover and, sitting on it, opened Facebook on her phone and typed Neil’s name into the search bar. They were still friends, but she had unfollowed him months ago. She scrolled through his home page, but there was nothing she hadn’t seen before. A photo of Neil and Kanika at Science World. A random article he had posted about something technology related, one that she didn’t comprehend. Anu clicked on his friends and searched for the name “Paula.”

  One profile appeared: Paula Tsi.

  Anu clicked on it. Her profile was private, yet some information was visible. She had graduated from Simon Fraser University in 2010, which by Anu’s count meant she was about thirty-two, and her profile photo had been taken on the Capilano Suspension Bridge. Her hands were fastened on the ropes on either side, lush evergreen and rock face and sky all around her.

  She knew she shouldn’t, but she clicked on the photo. She zoomed in, and in silence, the tears started to roll off her cheeks and onto her lap, her phone, her fingers.

  Of course she’d be beautiful.

  Paula was smiling at the camera. She had a wide, beautiful, kind smile.

  The smile of a woman who deserved a man like Neil.

  Anu’s hands shook as she stood up and tucked her phone into her back pocket. She flushed the toilet and then ran the tap as she blew her nose with toilet paper, dried her face with a clean hand towel. It smelled like lavender.

  Anu couldn’t turn back time; she didn’t want to. But this—moving on, moving forward—she wasn’t sure she could do that, either.

  chapter twenty-six

  LAKSHMI: Our munchkin will be six in the spring! Is Anu planning big party? I can come home for visit between terms.

  KUNAL: Oh, Lucky. Please come visit. I am missing you dearly.

  LAKSHMI: Kuku, you are my lovey-dovey doo. I miss you more than Shah Rukh misses Rani in Kuch Kuch Hota Hai.

  KUNAL: I cannot fall asleep without you, my honey. My Rani, my queen! Sending all the xoxoxoxox kisses and smooches and cuddles, Lucky Luckhoo chuku.

  ANUSHA: Ahem. You know this is the group chat, right?

  I have an idea, but you won’t like it.”

  Just then a piece of drywall broke off and slid down to the floor, widening the giant hole in the practice room wall. Anu’s dream was literally crumbling before her eyes.

  According to Imogen, some months before Anu took over the studio, Mags had hired a friend to mount an equipment rack. And mount it he had. The rack, although an eyesore, had neatly stored all the mats, ropes, blocks, and blankets
they could need.

  Of course, it had been mounted on a wall of plaster without the proper brackets and framing, and that morning, Anu and Imogen had come in to find that the rack had succumbed to gravity, ripping a hole in the wall on its journey down.

  “I think we should tear down the wall,” Imogen continued.

  Anu wheeled around. Imogen was sitting on the floor cross-legged, with specks of white dust and plaster all over her orange yoga pants.

  “Look how much space is back there.” Imogen pointed past her and through the hole. “We don’t need a storeroom. Those boxes are full of junk, anyway.”

  Anu had known Imogen was going to suggest this, but it still irritated her. All of Imogen’s grand ideas, including this one, would cost money, and Anu didn’t need to be a lawyer to understand that the landlord wouldn’t pay to fix it. The hole was Mags’ fault—so now it was Anu’s.

  Fucking Mags. Anu imagined where she was at that very moment, perhaps sitting at some pub outside London, sipping a pint of cider, or in some cozy, obnoxiously English sitting room with tea cozies and crumpets. Meditating, like a virtuous monk, on her sister’s back porch.

  “I’ve done the measurements,” Imogen said, “and if we had a wide-open space, we could double the class size.”

  Taking a deep breath, Anu picked up a piece of the plaster that had broken off. “It would be cheaper to fix the hole than redo the room.”

  “But it’s an investment.” Imogen stood up, set her hands on her hips. “Did you not hear me? It would double the class—”

  “Because we’re in desperate need of the room, hey?” Anu snapped. She shook out her hair. “Sorry. I didn’t mean that. I’m just upset.”

  The hole in the wall was only the latest setback for the studio, although admittedly the largest. Several of the new teachers she’d hired hadn’t work out, and Charlie—the only reliable teacher besides Imogen on the payroll—had quit to join a hot-yoga studio in Strathcona.

  Anu was running an unreliable, sparsely populated studio that no one knew about, and she could barely afford to pay the teachers’ and Imogen’s salaries, let alone one for herself. Sure, Imogen had launched a weekly trial program for new students and charged them chump change, but they’d only secured a handful of new students who stayed on after that. Evenings tended to stay relatively full with drop-ins by university students, but those classes alone just barely allowed Anu to pay the studio’s rent.

  They didn’t have enough students, and in the afternoons, more often than not the classes were empty.

  How long could she go on like this?

  Anu wondered if this was a sign that she was supposed to walk away. As much as she loved the studio, she’d been thinking this more and more. Now all she’d have to do was pay a contractor to fix the wall, and then she could leave. She’d call Mags, do her best not to yell at her for bolting that bloody equipment rack to the wall, and find out which hipster was interested in the space.

  Anu could cut her losses, assign the lease over to someone else, and by the time it had been turned into a coffee shop or a brow bar or a wine store, she would be back on track financially. She could increase her hours at the clinic no problem; the partners would love to have her on full-time. She could go back to saving responsibly.

  Imogen lay down full on the floor, extending her arms and legs like a starfish. Her eyes were closed.

  “I’m sorry for snapping at you,” Anu repeated, and Imogen didn’t respond. Anu searched her face for a moment, but just like every other day, it was unreadable.

  Anu helped Imogen clean up for a few minutes before leaving for the clinic, apologizing for not being able to stick around and help more. Despite the hole, the room was otherwise fine, and they’d be able to keep the studio open for classes.

  All day long at work, Anu’s mind had kept wandering back to the studio, and she couldn’t help but wonder what Lakshmi would have done in her situation. Even though Lakshmi had been a mother and wife first, and let everything else had come second, hadn’t she been brave? Hadn’t Lakshmi accepted the proposal of man who she knew wanted to leave India, move to an uncertain life abroad? At the age of fifty-eight, hadn’t she again left, this time for England, to do the master’s she’d always dreamed of?

  Finally, the workday was over, and Anu found herself sitting in the break room with Jenny, waiting for her phone yet again while reading out loud the pros and cons list of investing in the studio.

  “I either need to walk away right now or fix the whole place up and advertise. Imogen’s right. Nobody knows we exist.” Jenny didn’t respond, and so Anu continued. “That means taking out a business loan.”

  Jenny smiled at something on the phone, and Anu collapsed back on the office chair. “Are you even listening to me?”

  “Yes.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Blah-blah, business loan. I’m so confused, blah.” Jenny darted her eyes upward. “You’re still free this Friday, right?”

  “What’s this Friday?” Anu deadpanned.

  “Your date with Damien!” Jenny practically screamed.

  Anu grinned. Of course she knew her date with Damien was on Friday. Jenny had only mentioned it every single day since scheduling it the week before.

  “So you’re free?” Jenny asked again, missing the joke.

  Anu rolled her eyes. “Yes, I’m still free.”

  “Don’t forget. And don’t wear your mom jeans, OK? You have”— she glanced at her watch—“forty-seven hours prepare. Do you need help picking out an outfit?”

  “Your lack of faith is actually kind of offensive.” She paused. “And aren’t mom jeans in fashion?”

  “Yeah, eighties mom jeans are in fashion, like these.” Jenny tugged on the belt loop of her high-waisted trousers. “Yours are . . . I don’t even know what yours are.”

  Anu laughed, remembering the clothes she’d bought in London. She hadn’t worn them since she got back. In fact, most still had the tags on them and sat at the back of her closet.

  “I was listening before, you know . . . ,” Jenny said quietly, in a voice that forced Anu to look up. “I can’t tell you whether or not it’s a good idea to invest in your dreams. But I can say that, well, I haven’t seen you like this in years, Anu.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re energetic. You’re passionate. You’re laughing again and interesting—”

  “And not boring.” Anu finished.

  She paused. “You weren’t boring me, Anu. You were boring yourself.”

  Jenny was right. It wasn’t motherhood and marriage that had bored Anu; it was the way she had mindlessly thrown herself into them. Gone through whatever motion she had thought right, appropriate, and until she left Neil, she hadn’t dared to question a thing.

  “I can’t go into debt to prove something to myself, Jenny. I can’t keep making mistakes.”

  “You know that grown-ups don’t appear out of thin air, right? You have to actually grow. That means making mistakes, Anu. That’s the whole freaking point!”

  Anu stared at her, and Jenny rolled her eyes in her Jenny-like way.

  “Pretend for a second that the guy you made out with wasn’t eighteen: Do you regret kissing him or sleeping with Jude Law?”

  “Theo wasn’t actually Jude Law—”

  “I asked you, do you regret it?”

  Anu looked down at her hands. Although embarrassing, although she wouldn’t do anything like that again, there was no question that she’d had fun. “No.”

  “And do you regret punching that toxic wasteland of a man Ryan right in the schnoz?”

  Laughing, Anu shook her head.

  “Good, me either.” Jenny crossed her arms. “London? Do you regret that?”

  Anu had needed to leave to appreciate what she had at home. Anu knew that now, and so she shook he
r head.

  “And was marrying Neil a mistake?” Anu opened her mouth to say something, and Jenny cut her off. “Before you answer, think about it. Think about what I’m asking. Knowing it would end, do you wish you had never married Neil?”

  She took a deep breath, summoned the last twelve years of her life with him—the good and the bad.

  For a while at least, it had been a marriage, solid and real and supportive. It had brought her joy and pain and, above all else, their daughter.

  “No,” Anu said finally, “I don’t regret any of it.”

  “So then how were those things mistakes?” Jenny asked her quietly. “I know you went off the rails for a while there, but part of growing up is taking detours, Anu, so you can realize who you are and what you want.”

  Anu nodded, wringing out her hands. Hadn’t she known that all along?

  “Your Hallmark yoga crap might be rubbing off on me, but there are no such things as mistakes. You live, you learn, and you move on.”

  Thinking hard, Anu again realized how right Jenny was. As much as Anu didn’t like the woman she’d been while in a relationship with Ryan, hadn’t it taught her to trust herself and to follow her intuition? Find self-worth from within and not from others?

  Wasn’t she happy she had finally confronted her parents? That she was bold enough to go to London to begin with?

  And, as difficult as it had been, as hopeless as it often seemed, didn’t she want to run the yoga studio? Create something of her own?

  An ambition, she realized, she wasn’t ready to give up on.

  She could be in Vancouver, be a good mother, friend, and daughter, and she could do this, too. She didn’t have to leave her family, her responsibilities, to be the woman she wanted to be.

  “So,” Jenny said, slyly sliding Anu’s phone back to her, “what are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to bet on myself, Jen. Fuck it. I’m going into debt!”

  chapter twenty-seven

  ANUSHA: Hi, Mom. . . . Thinking about you a lot these days. [deleted]