China responded with silence.
Ashna soldiered on. “Well, she just won this crazy prestigious award, it’s the Indian version of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She wants me to be there when she receives it. I have to go to India. She needs me there. Shobi never needs anyone!” God, she wasn’t just going to be a frog, but her frog self was going to get struck down by lightning and burned to a crisp.
Why hadn’t she just told China the truth? Rico’s grown-up bearded jaw and man bun did a slow spin around her head, and a groan rose deep inside her. Then she thought about having to call Shobi and backtrack and the groan threatened to turn into a wail. This entire thing about being stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea was every bit as impossible as it sounded on paper. Only, the devil was green-and-golden-eyed and the sea was an ocean of maternal disappointment.
Shobi had been persistent since their lovely last call. Just today she’d called five times with her usual Shoban Gaikwad Raje disregard for little things, like what others wanted. The fact that Ashna was not answering her calls was just making her push harder. Or maybe Shobi had seen the footage of Ashna maiming one of the world’s most popular athletes. If she hadn’t watched the video yet, that would make her the only human with an internet connection who hadn’t.
The video had been viewed over five million times. That was five million people who’d seen her, a professional chef, drop a surgical-grade knife at the sight of a man every major magazine had declared the sexiest man alive.
And she had landed him in the hospital.
Or he had landed himself there while trying to keep her toes from being severed.
He was a hero.
She was a wreck.
Again.
“Plus, I don’t have a celebrity anymore. I broke mine, remember?”
China laughed. “You did not break him. He’s fine. The doctors drained his knee and he’s as good as new.”
Ashna ignored the relief that loosened the tightness in her chest at hearing he was fine and tried again. “China, I’m not—”
“Oh!” China cut her off as though she’d just had the greatest epiphany. “Now everything makes perfect sense!”
No, nothing made sense. Or at least none of this should make sense to China.
China lived in the apartment above the yoga studio next door to Curried Dreams. The yoga studio had been in China’s family for over a hundred years. Before anyone in America had any idea what yoga or yoga pants were, as her sister India, who now ran the studio, loved to say.
After Ashna had moved to California, China, India, and their brother Siddhartha were the only children she had been friends with aside from her cousins. But of course, like her family, they hadn’t known about her and Rico.
She had never breathed a word about him to anyone.
Her two secrets in high school. Soccer and Rico.
“What makes perfect sense?” Ashna asked, working hard to sound nonchalant.
“Well, I was wondering how you agreed to do the show. Now I get why.” China sounded positively impressed with herself for solving that most challenging of puzzles. “Your mom wanted you to go to India for her award thing, and you used this as an excuse to get out of that.”
Having friends was incredibly annoying. Good thing Ashna had so few. There was no point denying it. Plus, when it came to Shobi, the less she said the better. Every time Ashna opened her mouth about her, people drew all sorts of conclusions.
China chuckled. “Here I was thinking you were doing it to help a friend—namely me.” More chuckling, because of course China wasn’t actually upset. Who could be upset with a friend who always did as you asked? “And I was so thrilled when you got the luck of the draw.” China made an appreciative sound. “Although none of us at the channel can figure out how the powers that be were able to get someone like him on the show. Unless of course it has to do with what happened in your kitchen.”
There it went again, Ashna’s heartbeat, speeding up all the way to bursting. “I have no idea what you’re going on about,” she mumbled with more of that blasted nonchalance.
China wasn’t listening, she was having one of her conversations with herself. China vs. China, her siblings called it. “Or maybe it’s the surgery. Of course! His injury has caused him to retire earlier than he expected, and he’s looking to do something different with his life.”
And a Food Network show was what he had settled on? Ashna wasn’t a betting woman, but she’d bet her restaurant on the fact that Rico wasn’t looking to be a cooking channel star.
China stayed on the runaway train of her thoughts. “I can’t even imagine what they’re paying him. Do you think he needs the money? He sure doesn’t look like someone who does. I mean, just having someone line up that beard probably costs my month’s salary. See, that’s it, these celebrities can blow through money on all sorts of things. Celebrity does that, it makes your tastes all kinds of perverse and over the top.” The sound she made was anything but disgusted. “Did you see him, though? I mean, I’d love to see him do perverse things.”
Ashna cleared her throat. “Isn’t that wrong, given that he isn’t a woman?”
“Well, he’s beautiful. I’m a lesbian, not blind.”
Okay, time to turn China’s train around and bring her back on track. “If he can’t do the show will they still pay him?” Could it really be that Rico needed the money?
“He’s doing the show. And he’ll be fine so long as he doesn’t go slamming and sliding on his knee trying to heroically keep women from slicing off their toes at the sight of him.”
Ashna groaned. Inside she was wailing. She fell back on her bed.
Her ex–best friend let out a full-throated guffaw. “I get that he’s hot and all, but girl, keep your panties on!”
“Shut up. The knife slipped. It was an accident.”
“That’s not what the camera saw.”
Ashna jumped up again and started pacing again. “Listen, China. Please please please please, do not make me do this. Please. I cannot get on a set with him after that. Please. Please!” If it sounded like spineless, pathetic begging, that’s exactly what it was.
“Ashna, love,” China said with not a whit of humor left in her voice, “these are literally the best viewership ratings the channel has ever had. I mean ever. Like ten times over, ever. The CEO had me in her office yesterday. They’re doubling what they’re paying you. She just gave me a huge bonus. They will do anything to make sure you don’t try to get out of your contract. After that video going viral”—she made an excited squeaking sound—“the chance of you getting voted off anytime soon has become almost zero. You can actually win this! I’m sure the rest of the chefs aren’t thrilled, but they’d be stupid to not understand that everyone is going to be tuning in to watch. So, win-win for everyone!”
Ashna didn’t care. As China rhapsodized the impending success of her show at the expense of The Video—and Ashna’s self-respect—Ashna made her way down to the kitchen and pulled out her tea jars. She spooned a little tulsi, the slightest pinch of ginger powder, and Darjeeling loose leaf into a strainer cup, drawing strength from the alchemy of those flavors mingling. She’d find another way to save Curried Dreams. Just a few weeks ago the show hadn’t been an option. She would pretend those weeks hadn’t happened. God, how she needed those weeks to not have happened.