The Marriage Game

by Sara Desai

  Or was it?

  “Thank you for your time. I don’t think this is the right fit for me.” Layla pushed quickly to stand. If she was going to go back to a regular job, at the very least she should work for someone she respected. And if she did decide to be her own boss, she needed to move on, put the past behind her, and figure out exactly who she was and what kind of business she wanted to run.

  “You’re making a mistake,” Miles said. “A big one. No one else is going to hire you.”

  Layla smiled as she walked out the door. “Maybe that’s exactly what I need.”

  • 24 •

  SWEAT trickled down the back of Sam’s neck as he hesitated at the door to The Spice Mill. He’d been avoiding this talk with Nasir since the party, but it was long overdue.

  “I’m sorry. We’re closed until five.” A middle-aged woman with short-cropped hair looked up, her smile fading when she saw him. “Oh. It’s you from upstairs. Get out or I’ll throw my shoe.”

  Sam had a vague memory of seeing her coming in and out of the restaurant, but he’d never taken the time to ask her name.

  “I’m not here to cause trouble, Auntie-ji. I came to see Mr. Patel.”

  “Don’t you think you’ve done enough damage?” Her eyes narrowed. “Do you know the pain and suffering you’ve caused? All this. All the hard work. All they have done and you just throw them out on the street.”

  “Let the boy through, Pari,” Nasir called out from the kitchen door. “I want to hear what he has to say.”

  Sam made his way through the empty restaurant. They hadn’t opened yet for the evening and an elderly man was smoothing gold tablecloths over the sturdy wooden tables. The decor was a fusion of Indian and modern, rich with color and over-the-top displays.

  Nasir waved him into the kitchen, where a young chef glared at him as he stirred a giant pot of rogan josh. The delicious scent made Sam’s mouth water.

  “I wasn’t sure you would see me.”

  “We’re both businessmen,” Nasir said. “This is how business goes. We didn’t pay the rent for many months. I knew we were living on borrowed time. My son’s friends didn’t have the heart to kick us out, but they were struggling to carry us for so long.”

  “I still want to apologize for what happened.” The words tumbled out before he could stop them. “My partner and I were trying to secure a contract and the location was important to our clients. I told him to do what it took to make a deal. I’m not blaming him. The fault is entirely mine. I should have anticipated the outcome.”

  “Have you ever deboned a fish?”

  Sam all but gaped at the sudden turn of the conversation. “No. My mother wouldn’t let me do anything in the kitchen.”

  “Wash your hands. Grab an apron. It’s never too late to learn.”

  Sam wasn’t about to say no to Nasir, especially when the chef was holding a knife. He washed up and joined Nasir at the stainless steel counter.

  “Do what I do.” Nasir slit the belly of the fish in front of him with a flick of his wrist.

  Sam copied his steady movements, and they worked together in silence until both fish were deboned and neatly sliced.

  “You’re good with a knife,” Nasir said.

  “I used to be a surgeon. It didn’t work out.” Sam picked up another fish and sliced through the belly.

  “You failed?”

  “No. I quit.”

  “Quitting is worse than failing.” Nasir’s hands flew, deboning another fish in half the time. He’d been holding back, Sam realized, testing him. But now the real competition began.

  “Failing means you tried and couldn’t do it,” Nasir continued. “Quitting means you gave up.”

  “A surgeon at the hospital where I worked, my mentor, hurt my sister,” Sam said. “He was never punished. I couldn’t work there anymore. I couldn’t be a healer when I should have recognized the kind of man he was and when his continued freedom made a mockery of the oath we had sworn to uphold.”

  “Selfish,” Nasir muttered, half to himself. “Maybe I was wrong about you when we first met . . .”

  “Selfish?” Sam’s voice rose in pitch and he shot an apologetic glance at the angry chef and the two other cooks who were keeping an eye on them as they worked. “I’ve spent the last four years trying to bring him to justice. I sacrificed everything to put myself in a position where I could make it happen.”

  “You deprived the world of a skilled surgeon.” Nasir stopped, leaning on the bench as he drew in a breath. “Think of how many lives you could have saved. Instead, you cared only about one—”

  “My sister means everything to me. He destroyed her life. The least I could do is give her justice.”

  “Did she ask to be avenged?”

  John had asked him the same question. Nisha had never asked for vengeance. She just wanted to be done with Ranjeet and move on with her life.

  Nasir reached blindly for the stool behind him. Alarmed, Sam helped him sit. Without thinking, he placed his fingers on Nasir’s wrist and took a quick pulse.

  “I’m fine.” Nasir waved him away. “I’m just getting used to the new pacemaker.”

  “Your heart rate is a bit high. You need to rest. I’ll finish this while we talk.” He washed his hands again and picked up the fillet knife, trying to remember the complications of pacemaker implants. Had Nasir just pushed himself too hard? Infection in the incision? Nasir didn’t appear to be feverish. No clammy skin. His eyes weren’t dilated. Hands weren’t shaking.

  “So you did it for you,” Nasir said. “To make the guilt go away. To feel like a man again—to feel worthy.”

  And there it was in a nutshell. Yes, the guilt had been crushing him. He’d wanted to turn back the clock and be the boy who had beat up a gang of bullies for throwing a rock at Nisha in the playground, the teenager who had picked her up from parties, the brother she could count on. Not the narrow-minded ambitious resident who couldn’t recognize a monster when he saw one every day.

  Nasir moved to stand and Sam shook his head. “You should sit for at least ten minutes. Get that heart rate back down. Take a load off.”

  “I already took a load off,” Nasir grumbled. “Forty pounds. Gone. People will think my cooking isn’t good. Look, they’ll say. Nasir is so thin. He doesn’t eat his own food. Why should we go to his restaurant when Manoj Gawli down the street at Tamarind Restaurant is healthy and round?”

  Sam chuckled. “I don’t know anyone who measures the success of a restaurant by the diameter of the owner’s belly.”

  “You aren’t in the food business.” Nasir settled on his stool. “You’re in the quitting business. How would you know how to measure success?”

  “I came to see if we could keep you in the food business.” Sam slid his knife through the fish, his hands remembering how to cut and slice gently through flesh. “I found office space only a few blocks away that would meet our client’s requirements, and I’ve withdrawn the eviction proceedings. If you would be willing to stay on with us as landlords, then I’m sure I can convince my partner to move to the new location.”

  “Keep it.” Nasir gave a violent shake of his head. “I don’t want.”

  Sam couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You’re leaving?”

  “It’s time we moved on,” Nasir said. “Live our own life, our own dreams.”

  “This wasn’t your dream?”

  “This was my son’s dream.” Nasir sighed. “Everything bigger. Everything fancier. He wanted more than just a restaurant. He wanted a Patel family enterprise—packaged meals in the grocery stores, Patel-branded products and spices, cookbooks, television shows . . .” He drew in a weary breath. “It was all going to be run from the office upstairs. He decorated that space. Bright and modern, he said. Leave the pipes and beams exposed, don’t cover the brick . . .” Nasir threw his hand in the air
. “The only thing that was mine was the desk. Nice rosewood. Solid and sturdy. A desk like that will last forever.”

  “It’s a great desk.”

  “I brought it from the old restaurant.” Nasir gave him a wistful smile. “We were twenty years there. Small but cozy. Every night it was full. People lined up outside the door, talking and laughing. Jana handed out jalebis to the kids. And it was near the house. No long commutes every day. But for Dev, it wasn’t enough. He wanted more customers. A big name. He bought this building with his friends so we could have this space. How could I say no? He was my son.”

  “He wanted the best for you.”

  “He wanted it for him. He just didn’t know himself well enough to realize it.” Nasir pointed to the stack of fish that Sam had just filleted. “Look at that. I couldn’t have done better myself and I am a lifetime in the business. This is what your hands wanted to do. I felt ill and you were taking my pulse. You are a healer, and you’re throwing your gift away.”

  “I’m not worthy of that gift.” Sam put down his knife. “I failed everyone I cared about.”

  “You failed yourself by wallowing in your guilt,” Nasir said. “You can’t be in everyone’s head, guessing what they are going to do. The real measure of a man comes not when things go right, but what he does when things go wrong.”

  “I’m trying to fix everything.”

  “You can’t fix anything until you fix yourself.”

  “What about you?” Sam asked, trying to steer the conversation away from his failings. “If you leave this place, what will you do?”

  “We’re going to move back to our old location.” Nasir smiled. “We still own the building. I already gave notice to the tenant. We’ll freshen it up, bring some of this new equipment, and I can get back to being a chef and not a celebrity. My doctor thinks this is a good idea. Less stress. Less work. And less commuting.”

  Sam’s stomach clenched in a knot. He’d imagined everything staying the way it was. Layla would stay in the office. He and Royce would move down the block. Nasir would be downstairs. He couldn’t be with Layla, but he couldn’t imagine her anywhere else.

  “I drew up a lease for Layla.” Sam pulled out the document. “Do you think she’ll move back in?”

  “That’s not up to me. That’s up to you.”

  * * *

  • • •

  LAYLA made a perimeter check of the office, taking care to inspect every nook and cranny for any evidence of Royce’s crazy party. Whoever had cleaned up had done a good job. Not a trace remained. Her desk had been straightened, photographs in their frames, ornaments in the corner, and there was only a faint ring where her fishbowl had been.

  Only Sam’s desk wasn’t the same. Clean and bare, without the neatly stacked papers or the rows of sharpened pencils, it was as empty as the hole in her chest.

  She and Daisy had returned to the office to pack up their stuff, but now that she was back, it was difficult to leave. Not just because of the bittersweet memories, but also because she had finally found her name.

  Patel Personnel.

  It had everything Royce and Evan suggested—a catchy ring, alliteration, and meaning. But more than that, it was her. Could she have made the business work if she’d thought up the name earlier? Or was there another secret to success?

  “There were twenty-seven messages on the phone,” Daisy called out. “And they’re not just from people looking for jobs. Employers. Lots of them. What do you want me to do?”

  Layla’s stomach twisted in a knot. “I don’t know. I’ve been interviewing for jobs but—”

  “Are you crazy?” Daisy cut her off with an exasperated sigh. “You don’t have time for a job. All these people want you, not some big-name agency that doesn’t give a damn who they are. What happened to all your dad’s sayings? ‘Patels like to be their own boss,’ ‘Patels persevere,’ ‘Patels and pakoras are made to be together, especially at lunchtime when Daisy’s hungry.’”

  “Patels are also realistic. I gave this a go and it didn’t work out. I thought I could love someone again, and I got hurt. I thought I could make a fresh start and I’m back to where I was before.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Daisy’s voice rose in pitch. “You are nothing like the woman who ran away to New York. That woman was afraid to live. She dated guys she knew she couldn’t love and she took a job she knew she wouldn’t like so there was no chance she would get hurt again. But look at you now. You didn’t like how most agencies were run so you started your own damn business. You wanted a serious, stable relationship so you went on blind dates with total strangers and you fell for the strangest man of all.”

  Laughter bubbled up in Layla’s chest. “Sam isn’t strange.”

  “Yeah. He’s strange. Trust me. The whole pencil thing . . . and the tidy piles of paper . . . and don’t get me started on the chai.” She sighed. “And then there was the whole avenging his sister thing. Who does that?”

  “Pretty much everyone in every revenge movie ever made.” Layla ticked them off on her fingers. “Kill Bill, The Crow, Taken, V for Vendetta, Payback, The Punisher, True Grit, Braveheart, John Wick, Unforgiven . . .”

  “Now you’re just showing off.”

  “It doesn’t matter now,” Layla said. “I can’t love someone who is destroying my parents’ business as well as my own. I should never have played that stupid game with him. If I’d kicked him out the day we met, none of this would have happened.”

  Daisy spun around in her chair. “That game was never about the office. It was about him. If you really wanted him out of here, you would have sent him away.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. If I was interested in him, why would I interview the men on my dad’s list?”

  “Because of Jonas and all the men before him,” Daisy said. “And because of Dev. Because you knew you could get serious about Sam and it scared you. Going on your dad’s blind dates was the safe option, and the game meant you could keep Sam around.”

  Layla’s heart squeezed in her chest. “Well, he’s not around now, and even if I could stay here, I don’t want to.”

  “So what? You don’t need this office to be successful.” On a roll now, Daisy stood and gestured wildly. “You can run your business from anywhere—a coffee shop, or a shared office space, or even my parents’ garage, if you don’t mind sharing with Max.”

  Max barked at the sound of his name. Whoever had cleaned the office had also fixed his basket and collected his toys, but Max had refused to go near it since they’d come in.

  “But it’s not going to happen if you give up,” Daisy continued. “So you hooked up with a guy you liked and you lost him. So you have to move to another location. When you were in New York, you would never have taken those chances. You were too afraid of getting hurt. But you’re stronger now. Your biggest fears came true, and you’re still standing.”

  A smile curved Layla’s lips. “Where were you with the motivational speech when I ran away to New York?”

  “Right here waiting for you to come to your senses and move back home.”

  Layla leaned against her desk, toying with the cup of pencils. “I’ve been to three interviews this week with recruitment agencies and I couldn’t see myself at any one of them. The idea of starting from the bottom again, having to answer to someone, pandering to corporate clients, and playing office politics just doesn’t appeal after running things on my own. This business was a dream I had that I never thought would come true, and then it did.” She pulled out the scrap of paper she had written on after her interview and handed it to Daisy. “And now, I’ve come up with a name . . . Patel Personnel. I think Lakshmi Auntie would call that a sign.”

  “That’s awesome. I love it!”

  The door opened and Layla’s father walked into the office. She moved to help him, and he waved her away. “I’m fine, beta. I took the elev
ator this time. I never got a chance to see your new office so I came for a visit while you are here.” His gaze fell on the purple chaise. “Did Deepa Auntie give you that?”

  “Yes. And the elephant table and beaded lamp.”

  “She never did have any taste.”

  “Are there fresh pakoras in the kitchen, Nasir Uncle?” Daisy already had her bag in her hand.

  “I put aside a plate for you, and there’s a special treat for Max. You’d better hurry before they’re gone.”

  Max wagged his little tail and followed Daisy out the door. Layla sat beside her father on the chaise as he looked around.

  “We didn’t really do much with it,” Layla said. “We thought one of us was going to leave.”

  “Dev decorated this office.” Her father patted her knee. “It was supposed to be the heart of the Patel family enterprise.”

  “I remember,” she said gently. “He had big dreams, and we could have made them come true if not for what Sam and his partner did.”

  Her father leaned back, stretching his legs under the elephant table. “Sam withdrew the eviction proceedings and offered us a new lease with better terms.”

  “That’s great, Dad.” A wave of relief washed over her. “You don’t have to leave.”

  “I told him no,” her father said. “The big restaurant, the Patel enterprise . . . that was never our dream.”

  “But what will you do?” Her parents had run the restaurant since before Dev was born. She couldn’t imagine them doing anything else.

  “We’re going to relocate the restaurant back to Sunnyvale. That’s where we belong. We came here for Dev, and we stayed for his memory. But now it’s time for us to go. This illness has made me realize that in the short time we have here, we can’t cling to the past. This location isn’t good for a family restaurant, and I don’t need a big Patel enterprise to be happy. I need my daughter and my wife, my family and my friends, and a small restaurant in the heart of our community where the tables are always full and people drop by for a cup of chai to share their day with us. The eviction was the push we needed to make a new start. I told Sam this so he didn’t feel so bad.”