The Bandit Queens (68)

“Right.” Saloni coughed. “Listen, Geeta, I—”

“Oi, what’s he doing here!”

“Oh! I forgot.”

“What’s going on?” Geeta asked Karem, who was playing fetch with Bandit near her door. Upon their approach, Bandit sniffed Saloni’s ankles and then mounted her calf. Saloni shook him off and moved to the other side of Geeta. Bandit followed.

“Saloniben asked me to drop another one off for you.” Karem pulled a bottle from a cloth bag.

Saloni tittered, still shooing Bandit. “Oh yes, my gift to you, Geeta. I’m tired of coming over and you only having water. Oi, can you please tell your dog that I’m a married woman?”

“When did you—” Oh. The keys she’d allegedly forgotten. “Never mind. Fine. Do you want to come in? Bandit! Leave it!”

“No,” Saloni said as Karem said, “Yes.” He began stammering. “Oh shit, I—my mistake.”

Saloni’s grin was mortifying. “Karembhai, I’d promised Geeta some company but now I must be off. Will you stay and have a chat?”

“Sure.” When Karem bent to pet Bandit, Geeta pinched Saloni’s elbow and hissed, “What are you doing?”

“What are you doing? You need an alibi! Let him stay!”

“We already set our alibis.”

Before she left, Saloni waggled her brows in a way Geeta could only describe as obscene. “Let him stay anyway.”

Geeta unlocked her door but did not go inside. “You don’t have to. She—she’s just messing around. I’m sure you need to be with the kids.”

“They’re okay. I’d like to talk to you, if that’s all right?”

She nodded. “Bring in Bandit, too. He must be hungry.”

Karem surveyed her home much like she had his. His focus landed on her desk while she took the bottle and went to the outside stove to boil some water. “Why don’t you drink?” she asked. “Is it for religious reasons?”

He pressed a light finger to her radio. “I’ve tried it, I just never cared for it. Was always more about tobacco. My daughter’s made me promise to quit, though, and I’m down to one beedi a night.”

“Saloni wants me to try it with her.”

“I didn’t know you and Saloniben were so close.”

“We used to be. Maybe we are again. I dunno. It’s all very new.”

“New can be good.”

“Karem, I feel I should say: that night, what we did, I…”

“Yes?”

“I had a nice time.” Here she tried to roll her eyes at herself—to let him know the joke was on her and she knew it—but it fell flat and ugly. “Before I ruined it, I mean.”

“You didn’t ruin anything.” At her doubt, he laughed. “We both ruined it. It was a mutual failing. And I also had a nice time. You’re a straightforward woman, and I respect that.”

Geeta cringed, but he must’ve been too preoccupied with his next words to notice, because he continued: “So I’ll also be straightforward. I said we’re friends, Geeta, which is true, but we’re adults, too; and it’s obvious I have motives that go beyond friendship. It’d be childish to deny it, not to mention a waste of time, and I have so little of that as it is. But nothing has to go beyond friendship—I just like your company.”

Geeta swallowed. People didn’t play games in these matters because it was fun, she realized, they did it because the alternative was to fling open your arms to rejection and say do with me what you will. The water was roiling. As she added a bowl of rinsed lentils, she said, “I like yours, too. You’re correct: we’re adults and my…motives also go beyond friendship.”

“Yes, I suspected.”

She smiled with a self-deprecation that emerged from this new security. “What gave it away? When I nearly ate your face off?”

His laugh was sharp but not unkind. “That was one clue, yes. See? Straightforward.”

“So you’re okay with…keeping this between us?”

“It should be between us anyway. It’s not anyone else’s business.”

“Yeah, okay, good.” She nodded. And kept nodding. “So, um, what does this mean, exactly?”

“I think it means we see each other when we want and can. And we can eat each other’s faces off if we want, too.”

“And…the rest? The other stuff?”

“Ah. Um. We’ll just figure that out as we go? How does that sound?”

“Nice. It sounds nice.”

She vacillated between relief that she was able to smile and guilt for the same. It was a nauseating pendulum.

“I’ll just feed Bandit.” She drained the lentils and cooled them. They walked inside, where Bandit immediately abandoned his lizard nemesis for food. At the moment, she could not imagine ever eating again.

A gamut of dread awaited in the days ahead. A month prior, a quiet life had yawned before her. Now she was plagued by the realization that what she had done would stain her for all her lonely days. But tonight, tonight she couldn’t quite summon anxiety or dread or guilt, she could only manage numbness. The relief of it! She knew it was not sustainable. This reprieve was a boon she had not expected. Even her gratitude for this gift was distant and academic, such was her numbness. She should send Karem away—it wasn’t decent to drag him into her damage—but the prospect of being alone with memories of the night (“trauma” was a word she felt dramatic using despite its applicability) was enough to make her ask, “Will you sit with me? I—I don’t think I’m ready for more right now, but would you mind sitting with me?”