She pauses, curiously asks, “Did you say yes right away or made him wait?”
“I asked him to talk about our marriage first,” I confess and still feel embarrassed the same way when Raag proposed. It’s going to take some time to get over it.
“What?” she shrieks right into my ears. “I knew there was something wrong with you. Did you tell Jiju that you are crazy?”
“Bansi…shut up!” I scold her. “Besides, he knows that.” I hear her sigh. I figure she won’t go if I don’t tell her the whole thing. So quickly I tell her, “Raag just proposed outside on the balcony, and I did say yes. Now go.” I think I am almost asleep.
“What about the kiss?” she inquires again. Then she adds, “You know I opened the door when I couldn’t hear any of your whisperings!” Bansi says, and though I am lying on the bed on my tummy, I pick the pillow that rests on my head and throw aimlessly.
“Bansi! We did kiss! Now go!”
“You missed!” she announces, and I stop hearing her or I fall asleep. I can’t recall.
CHAPTER 13
Breaking the Norm
In the early damp morning, I open my eyes to my mother’s chittering. “Wake up, Mayu! They are coming in an hour!” She is in my bedroom.
Though her voice is alarming, I sit up leisurely and yawn as I ask, “Who?” I curl up my legs closer to my chest and circle my arms around them for support, not caring for my hair falling over my face.
“Preeto Auntie is coming with Raag kumar,” she says, her voice high-pitched. I open my eyes to see her dusting the bedroom door, the chair, the computer table and almost everything, including me, or so it seems.
“When?” I am too tired to grasp or process any information.
“We are not even slightly prepared!” My mother, Mrs. Kaveri-Stressed-Out-Bhatt, sounds aghast as she speaks without caring for answering my question. “They should have told us earlier…I could have prepared snacks and cleaned the house.”
I look at her, yawning. I am not sure what I should tell my mother. Should I tell her that perhaps our house is neither a museum that Raag and his mother would keenly observe each antique piece, nor it is a restaurant that they would judge the variety and taste of the snacks? However, it is a different thing that with our unique and peculiar ways, each one of my family members, including myself, qualifies to be put in a museum.
“I thought Preeto would tell me at least,” my mother grumbles, and her anger at her friend is quite apparent.
There is trouble in paradise too, I guess.
Then as if my mother understands her friend’s side, she says, “What can she also do?” She shakes her head in disapproval. “I also don’t understand your generation!” She looks at me with narrowed eyes and shakes her head in sheer disappointment, as if blaming each and every fault of my entire generation upon me.
Besides, Raag and I are in a totally different generation. At times, the universe.
My mother continues, “Raag kumar decided to surprise everyone. Look at our house!” She exclaims, throwing her hands in the air. Utterly dramatic. “I am afraid he will be surprised!” She scolds while smacking the dusting cloth on the table, and a few books fall. I think the books fell out of sheer terror my mother inflicted upon them.
However, I believe that she shouldn’t be worried at all—after all, the surprise part is well taken care of by my under-the-rain looks. At least today, nothing else can have the same impact on Raag kumar.
“Mummy…can you stop cleaning my room? Go downstairs please, and I will come to help you,” I say sleepily, ignoring her worries.
She pauses for a second and strangely smiles. “Oh, you don’t have to help me today! You should dress up nicely. I have asked Bansi to skip her coaching class to help me.” She has an unavoidable grin on her face.
Oh, that’s annoying. I would rather prefer my mother angry for a little longer. I don’t take so long to get ready anyway. What is there to dress up? I ask myself.
Raag saw me in my rugged old pajamas and T-shirt at rainy midnight, and he still thought I was beautiful. He even compared me with the moon. There is nothing to impress there.
But again, don’t they say—love is blind!
“Mummy, I will help you. Let Bansi go. Her studies are important.” Finally, I get a grip and get up.
“If you say so, I will let Bansi go then. Your father didn’t want her to skip classes anyway.” My mother ignores the fact that I asked her to leave and keeps wiping the mirror attached to the cupboard. I think she is going to be in this state for some time now. I let her be and head for the bathroom, closing the door behind me.
My mother’s voice is loud enough for me to hear through the closed door. “You know, your father was angry in the morning anyway! On top of that, Raag kumar did this! Now, your father is furious!” She continues her anger-filled complaints. I start brushing my teeth staring in the mirror and ask, “Why was he angry in the morning?”
My father could be angry for many reasons in general. It is always good to have a head start.
“His vines!” my mother exclaims. I freeze at her answer and keep staring at myself in the mirror with my eyes wide open. She continues, “So many are broken near the front balcony. Your father thinks monkeys did it early in the morning. He was in a bad mood when Preeto called.”
Oh, God. No! This is not good. I am sure we broke some of his precious vines yesterday moving up and down the balcony. I collect myself and finish off the rest of the brushing.
“Try to handle your father. That itself would be a huge help,” my mother says, and I don’t reply as I am in the middle of gargling. I wonder if anyone can handle my father.
Today, it is like we provided a perfect cocktail—broken vines mixed with the future son-in-law’s surprise entry—to my angry old man.
“Anyway, you don’t worry too much. Wear sari today, no! Do you want my red bandhani?” she asks, referring to a type of tie-dye textile popular in Gujarat. Just as she says this, I cough water back into the sink.
“Mummy,” I almost scream out of horror. “No sari. I am going to wear a dress. You know it’s too much to handle sari for me.”
“Raag kumar would like to see you in a sari, no! For the first time!”
I give it a thought and reject it instantly, as I picture myself tripping over in a sari and causing sheer mortification to myself. Besides, that first-time charm is a good story one day I would like to tell my grandkids.
“You never listen to me. At least today, you should. After all, how long do I have you?” Her tone is melodramatic.
“Mummy, please don’t blackmail me. For you, I agreed to this whole arrangement. Didn’t I?” I say it quickly after finishing my gargling. I tricked my mother into believing that I only agreed to this arranged marriage because of her persistence. And that’s not melodramatic at all!
“Okay, okay! Wear whatever you want. I was saying for your good only.” My mother pauses. “You talk with Raag kumar days and nights. Don’t you? What’s wrong in a sari?” She tries for the one last time.
Opening the bathroom door, I stand by that and look at my mother intently, “Mummy…can you please go and start cooking? I will come downstairs as soon as I can.”