The Taste of Ginger(91)

“You mean, if you ended up with someone who looked like him. Someone white.”

I slowly nodded. “But I did love him. I was willing to give up everything for him and for that love.”

In the distance, we could hear the chaos from the Ahmedabad streets, but within the garden walls, it felt serene and calm.

“I have to tell you something about him.” I took a deep breath, knowing we could have no more secrets between us. “After Hari’s wedding, I called Alex, and I was ready to go back to him.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“I thought love was enough, and I knew it meant I would lose you and Dad, but I saw him as my future and had to choose him. But then I learned he had moved on to someone else, and what I thought we had wasn’t really that strong after all.” My voice caught in my throat. “I am so glad that he had moved on because now I know he wasn’t worth losing my family over. He wasn’t worth losing you. If that is the price of love or assimilation, then it’s too high. I’m just so ashamed that I couldn’t come to that conclusion earlier.”

My puffy eyes met her composed ones, marking a generational divide: I had never learned to bury my emotions the way my mother had—and I didn’t want to.

“Come here, beta,” she said, putting her arm around my shoulders and pulling me closer.

It seemed she was beginning to understand she had to let me be my own person, and then I would learn life’s lessons in my own way. I stared ahead as tears flowed down my cheeks and dripped onto her shawl. These tears were more solemn, somehow older, than the ones I had shed in the past. They were the type my mother had shed on the few occasions when I had seen her cry: the day her own mother passed away, the day my father lost his job, and the day of Uma’s funeral.

“It was hard to watch you making such a big mistake,” she said.

I sniffled and cleared my throat. “Despite how things turned out, I don’t think of Alex as a mistake. I learned from that relationship; learned so much about myself. Sometimes you have to let me make my own choices even if you think they’re wrong.”

“It’s hard for you to understand unless you have children. It is my job to protect you. I wanted your life to end up better than mine—for you to find a respectable man who will not cause the society to gossip about you. Someone who will take care of and protect you when your father and I no longer can. That is our job as your parents.”

The swing creaked while we both processed what the other had said. A warm breeze blew through the garden. Mom moved her arm from around my shoulders and adjusted her shawl.

“If we had stayed in India and you and Neel had been raised here, the family would have found someone more suitable for you.” She played with her yellow-gold wedding ring, twisting it around her finger in an endless loop. “That was the life I was brought up in. I had no choices. Marriage was a business contract between the families. Love was never a factor. And when it was, it ended up poorly.” She faced me. “But you were right earlier. We are different people, and these are different times.” The swing creaked softly as it moved back and forth. “Have you decided to accept Tushar’s proposal?”

“Would it matter to you if I did?”

Her mouth set into a line. “It may not be easy for us, but we will try.”

It was honest and was the best she could offer. It was more than I’d ever gotten from her before, and I knew I had to accept that.

After a few moments, I said, “I told him no.”

She raised her eyebrow. “How did he handle it?”

“Like the respectable man he was raised to be.”

She nodded.

As I thought about Tushar and what he would have given up for me, I understood how my mother had felt about Alex. She thought the sacrifices were too great, and now I realized she had been right. I couldn’t let Tushar make the same mistake I once had. His family and culture were too important to risk for something and someone who was so unknown to him. I could not put him in the same position my mother had been in and end up with a broken engagement.

“Marrying Tushar would not be fair to him,” I said. “I need to understand myself before I can marry another person. Any other person.”

She looked at me. Understanding oneself and one’s identity didn’t factor into marriage decisions in India, especially when she’d been getting married, so my words were a novel concept.

“How did you learn that your engagement was broken?”

A wry laugh escaped her lips. “When I heard he was engaged to someone else ten days after ours had been decided.”

I gazed at her. “He didn’t even tell you himself? How awful! What a coward. I’m sorry that happened to you.”

“We cannot control other people,” she said. “But yes, he was exactly that!”

“I went to Happy Snaps and told Tushar in person,” I said. “With the apology he deserves for any problems he will face with his family because of me. He did nothing wrong, and I needed him to know that.”

A smile warmed my mother’s face. Even though I’d always assumed she wanted to see me married at any cost, I now sensed I had made the decision she’d quietly preferred. “I’m proud of you for recognizing that.”

“You were right too. I was naive to think love alone is enough. A sense of culture and family are important as well. Those things never go away, even if you try to ignore them. I realize they are a part of who I am, and even if my future partner doesn’t have the same background, he has to respect and appreciate mine just as I would his. You can’t trade in your culture for another. A leopard doesn’t change its spots, as Monali Auntie would say.”