There's Something About Sweetie(64)

Ashish stared at Pinky, his longtime best friend/pain in the butt. He’d never heard her speak like that before. There was no hint of sarcasm, no rolling of eyes or sighing in great displeasure. He hazarded a glance at Samir, who looked totally bowled over too.

“I … I didn’t look at it like that,” Samir said. He blew out a breath. “You’re right. There’s nothing I can do to control what happens.” He paused. “Who am I doing this for?”

“Think about it,” Ashish said gently. “Only you can decide what you want to do, but just don’t discount your own happiness, man.”

“Yeah, because it makes you a total douche nozzle, apparently,” Pinky said, rolling her eyes. Okay, she was back.

Samir chuckled, though he still looked somewhat dazed. “I’m definitely going to give it more thought. But right now I’d really like a distraction. So Oliver and Elijah are still broken up?”

“Yep.” Ashish swiveled in Samir’s chair. “Elijah’s being a total dumb-ass.”

“So is Oliver,” Pinky said. “I mean, accusing Elijah of cheating? Does that sound like something he’d even consider doing?”

Ashish felt a flash of pain as he thought of Celia. How he’d trusted her and how he’d been totally wrong. “You never know. People do weird things sometimes.” Saying it out loud just made him feel like a train wreck. Why was he talking to her again? Ugh. He’d spent hours on the phone with her just because she’d cried. “It’s going to be interesting seeing them both together on Band Night at Roast Me,” he added, just to take his mind off Celia.

“But they’ve been at basketball practice together, right? And that was okay.” Pinky shrugged. “So maybe it won’t be so bad.”

“There’s so much going on during practice, though,” Ashish said thoughtfully. “And as soon as we hit the showers, Oliver jets out of there before he can so much as lay eyes on Elijah. They haven’t really hung out together since the breakup.”

“You know, it’s odd,” Samir said. “I always thought they’d end up going to the same college and then getting married after.”

“We all kinda thought that,” Pinky replied.

They were quiet for a long moment.

“This can’t be it for them,” Samir said suddenly into the silence.

“What are you thinking?” Pinky asked, one skeptical eyebrow raised.

“Something to remind them how good it used to be.” Samir picked up the ball, threw it at his wall, and then caught it again. “Something that reminds them of what they’re missing.”

“Good luck,” Ashish mumbled. Every time he’d so much as tried to bring up Oliver’s name to Elijah, he’d been met with the Death Glare. “You’re gonna need it.”

Close to midnight, Ashish sat on his balcony with a Yoo-hoo, debating the merits of taking a shower then or later. He was pretty tired, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to fall asleep anytime soon anyway. He scrolled through his Instagram feed—which was now pretty empty, after he’d deleted all the pictures of him and Celia and hadn’t posted any new ones—and stopped at one that made him smile.

It was his brother, Rishi, with Dimple, the girl he was dating. They were both standing on a hill, with the San Fran skyline behind them. Their arms were wrapped around each other, both of them grinning so hard, their eyes were just little slits. They were practically bursting with sunshine and love. The caption read, Seven-month anniversary of the first date. Think I’ll keep her. Wait, she wants me to tell you guys that SHE’S the one keeping ME. And then there was an eye roll emoji. If they weren’t so ridiculously cute, Ashish would vomit. He liked the post and then wrote a comment: Maybe come home sometime this century so we can all see the happy couple?

His phone beeped almost immediately with a text.

Rishi-o: Done. When’s the big game that all the scouts are coming to?

May 10th.

We’ll be there. Ignore the screaming and cheering.



How are you?

Ashish sighed. Great. Rishi never asked him how he was like that. Ma had obviously blurted out something about his humiliating breakup. But before he could respond, another text came through:

Celia told Dimple you guys broke up

Oh. Ashish felt immediately guilty for the vote of no confidence he’d given his poor mother. Fine.

Dude. You don’t have to do that with me. This is your bhaiyya

Ashish wanted to roll his eyes, but instead he felt this alarming lump in his throat. The truth was, no matter how much he’d hated Rishi for being the golden child, he was a good big brother. They’d had their ups and downs (okay, so before Rishi left for college, it had been a lot more downs), but in the end Ashish always knew that he could count on Rishi to be there for him. And what else mattered, really?

Not so hot in that case, he typed before he lost his nerve. But I’m dating someone new

His phone rang immediately, and Rishi’s goofy face popped up on the screen. Sighing slightly, Ashish answered. “Yo, bhaiyya.”

“Yo yourself, you gigolo.”

Ashish did roll his eyes then. “No one uses that word.”

“Except me. So tell me more about this new girl!”

“What’s all that noise?”