There's Something About Sweetie(10)

Ma darted Pappa a knowing glance. Why did parents think their kids never saw that stuff? Ashish could practically touch the thought bubble she was transmitting at him: TALK TO YOUR SON.

“What’s this, beta?” Pappa asked. “Ma tells me you’re having some … problems? Ladki vaali problems?”

Oh God. The fact that Pappa had just said “problems of the girl variety” did not bode well. He was probably gearing up for a relationship talk. Pappa would just tell him again that this was his youth, aka javaani, talking, and in due time he’d find Ashish the perfect Indian girl just like he had for Rishi. To not take any of this seriously. To just live life. As if the pain Ashish was feeling were only as serious as a stomach upset, nothing that a cold glass of jal-jeera wouldn’t fix. (Which, okay, the cumin drink was delicious, but it smelled like farts and no one ever talked about that. Anyway.)

“You know, Ashish, you’re young. And in our javaani we must all make certain mistakes. Don’t be so serious, beta!” As if on cue, Pappa laughed heartily. Ashish was pretty sure he’d laughed in exactly the same spot during the last relationship talk. Did he have a script stashed somewhere? “When the time comes, Ma and I will make that decision for you. And then you’ll see the difference!” He and Ma smiled at each other.

Ashish glared at them from over the top of his matka kulfi. So smug. Oh, so smug. “Oh yeah? What difference is that?”

Pappa raised his eyebrows in a Really? Are you serious? way and then began to count off on his fingers. “Crystal. Heather. Yvette. Gretchen. And Celia.” Then, holding up his other hand, he raised his index finger. “Dimple. See the difference?”

Ma cleared her throat and glared at Pappa. “What Pappa means to say, beta,” she said in that gentle way of hers, “is that we have years and years of life experience that you don’t have. So of course you’re going to make mistakes. And be … hasty, hmm? It’s no wonder you feel like this.”

Ashish knew she was trying to help. But it just rubbed him the wrong way. They kept saying what a mistake this was. They kept implying he was just some silly kid, whereas they, in their infinite wisdom, would never make the same mistake he did. Like, the instant they thought of a girl for him, Cupid himself would descend from the clouds and rope Ashish and the girl into an everlasting bond. “So you’re saying you’d never make a mistake? Whatever girl you found would be the perfect one, no question?”

“Of course that’s what I’m saying!” Pappa said just as Ma said, “Not exactly in those terms, but …”

They smiled at each other and shrugged, like, Well, if you want to put it like that, we won’t stop you. …

Ashish pushed his matka kulfi aside. Samir’s voice began to echo in his ears. Something else, probably his survival instinct, told him not to listen to it. Walk away, Ash, man, it said. Walk away while you still can. Before you make a gigantic mistake. But Ashish was in no mood to listen. He just wanted to prove Ma and Pappa wrong. “Okay, then. Do it.”

Ma and Pappa sat back and looked at him. “Do what?” Pappa asked.

“Set me up with a girl you think would be good for me. Rishi wasn’t much older than me when you set him up with Dimple.”

“Yes, but he was out of high school,” Ma said. “Now is the time to focus on studies and basketball—”

“Ma, I never focus on studies, and basketball is going to be a part of my life through college, too.” Ashish shrugged. “Unless you want me to ask Dana Patterson, the cheerleader, out.” Like he could even do that in his current demojoed state. But they didn’t know that.

Ma’s eyes widened and she looked at Pappa, making frantic hand motions that, Ashish supposed, he wasn’t meant to see.

“So you’re saying you’ll … date someone we pick for you,” Pappa said. “I want to make sure.”

“Yes, exactly. And I know I’m too young for this to be an arranged marriage or whatever, but it’s the same thing with Rishi, right? I mean, he and Dimple probably won’t get married till she’s done with grad school at least. But if the girl and I don’t get along, you have to both promise to never give me another relationship talk again. For as long as any of us are alive.”

Ma and Pappa looked at each other across the table and then at him. They were both smiling. “Okay,” Ma said, her voice bubbling with excitement. “But you are going to lose, beta.”

Pappa nodded seriously. “You are going down to downtown,” he said in his thick Indian accent, and Ashish couldn’t help but laugh.





CHAPTER 4





“Hand me the pink. I want pink because this poster’s going to be really pink,” Pinky said, reaching over Elijah for the paint.

“Say ‘pink’ again,” he said, handing it over.

“Pink,” she said automatically, beginning to paint in the lettering on her poster. Her hair was up in a multicolored pile on her head, and tendrils of green and purple and blue blew lightly in the breeze.

Ashish squinted down at the poster. They were all sprawled in the garden portion of the backyard, sheltered by a grove of trees. “So what’s this protest for again?”

“They’re developing that section of Bennington Park where Bennington Lake runs. Their plan is to drain the lake.” She looked up at them, brown eyes wide in outrage. Her nose ring winked in the sunlight.