The Vibrant Years(71)

“Oh, Cullie, stop apologizing. I’m the one who’s sorry. I am so very sorry.” She’d spent so much time trying to be a good parent, and she’d missed the basics.

“But I’m really doing well now. Shloka helps, and I have a therapist who’s helped me learn not to fight the feelings. And, Mom”—she paused—“I take medication.”

“Honey, that’s wonderful. You’ve taken care of yourself. I’m proud of you and so ashamed I wasn’t there for you.”

“You were there. You are. It was me too. I had to figure this out for myself. You know how stubborn I am.”

“You, stubborn? No!”

Cullie laughed, but her eyes were thoughtful. “Can people really change, Mom? Because I feel different.”

Aly wiped her eyes. “I guess they can. Because I feel different too.”

“Who knew it was possible to improve on perfection?” A grin tugged at Cullie’s lips again.

“So,” Aly said. “This guy. He’s from India?”

The grin spread across Cullie’s face, running rampant across it and brightening her eyes, and she didn’t even try to hide it. “I’ve just met him. So no one’s doing anything weird like getting married, okay?”

“Okay.”

Cullie barely seemed to hear her. “He’s nothing like me, Mom. He doesn’t even know how to retrieve a file from his motherboard.”

“What? People like that exist?”

“Very funny. But it’s not just that. We have no idea what the other person is talking about when it comes to work, but I know exactly how he feels about it. He makes films. Documentaries. And restores and preserves old celluloid film. But he’s just so . . . I don’t even know what to call it. Nice? Decent? But also . . .” She colored. Her Cullie was blushing. “You know, really hot.”

Aly found her hand pressed to her mouth. She had never seen Cullie like this. Then she pulled her hand away so Cullie wouldn’t think she was overreacting and shut down again, because seeing Cullie like this was the best thing that had happened to Aly in her entire life.

When she’d first met Ashish and told her mother about him, her mother had been terribly excited that he was from India, but then she’d been heartbroken that he wasn’t Catholic and then doubly heartbroken when he’d refused to convert.

But Ashish had won them over. By becoming the son they’d never had. For her.

“Mom, will you stop trying so hard to manage your reactions, please? It’s okay for you to be thrilled that he’s from India.”

“I’m not thrilled because he’s from India. I’m thrilled because of how you’re talking about him. Do we get to meet him?”

Yup, her cheeks were definitely flushed. “Is it okay if I bring him to Binji’s for dinner this week?”

Aly forgot about holding herself back and threw her arms around Cullie.

“You have to promise not to be weird. We’re just friends. It’s not a relationship or anything. He’s just, he just misses his home, I think. It’s not like—”

All Aly could do was squeeze her daughter and laugh until her heart felt like it would burst.





CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO


BINDU


I’ve encountered few greater tragedies than keeping art from an audience because we’re afraid to tip the balance of society with our norms of shame.

I wish I’d had the honor of sharing Bhanu’s talent with the world. But even more, I wish it hadn’t been stolen from her.

From the journal of Oscar Seth

As a young girl, Bindu had loved to sneak off to the forbidden Foreigner Beaches attached to Foreigner Hotels and spy on the bikinied bodies. It was what her mother believed had corrupted her.

Aie had been right, because that’s where she’d met Oscar. Bindu had been snooping around the pool in the red bikini she hadn’t stolen but had found abandoned on the spikes of an aloe bush when the manager of the hotel caught her. He’d asked for her room number, leering the entire time. Bindu refused to wrap her arms around herself to hide from his ugly gaze. The filth in the way he looked at her was his problem, not hers.

She’d thrown out a number as calmly as she could, trying to figure out how she could make a run for it without her clothes.

There’s no room by that number, he’d said, moving too close with his eggy breath, and then grabbed her arm.

Is there a problem? Oscar’s voice had been the snap of a whip. Did you forget our room number again, darling? he said to her, tone deathly calm, eyes on the manager’s hand crushing her arm.

The manager let her go and practically fell to his knees apologizing.

We’re here for the next three months, Oscar said, making it obvious why not many people dared to speak in his presence. I want you to work in a different part of the hotel. Don’t let me, or her—he threw Bindu a look of such fond familiarity, she felt like she really was his darling—see you again.

For Bindu, all of seventeen, it had been love at first sight. The way he’d looked at her. Not as though she were a body but as though he saw how she wore her body, and it told him what she carried inside it and it changed the way he saw the world. Instead of thanking him, she raised her chin, so he’d know she wasn’t about to do anything funny to show her gratitude. Then she attempted to slip past him.