From Twinkle, With Love(42)

“That was excellent thinking.” Sahil paused. “Something I’ve learned from studying the film industry is that directing’s about helping your actors insinuate themselves into the parts they’re playing as much as it is about getting them on film. I feel like you have this innate grasp of that process. You’re going to touch so many people with your movies, T. I hope you know that.”

I studied his face, my heart thumping. Sahil saw what I was doing—what I was trying to do as a director—and more than that, he believed I could do it. I’d been afraid of doing something as intimate as making art with him watching, but Sahil was one of the few people who not only saw Twinkle the artist, but respected Twinkle the artist. If Mummy’s ignoring my art made me feel invisible, Sahil’s recognition was like being surrounded by a million neon lights.

“Thank you,” I said, looking away and out over the carnival, at the tiny people milling around on the ground below us. I was afraid he’d see in my eyes what I was beginning to suspect—that his heart knew my heart. That my soul was a piece of his.

“So,” Sahil said after a moment of crystalline silence. “Do you ever think about what you want to do after high school?”

I shrugged and faced him again, now that the moment was broken. “I don’t know. My dream is to go to USC, like George Lucas or somebody. But it’s expensive. I’d pretty much need a full ride, and I don’t think my grades are good enough for that.” I tried to pretend saying all of this out loud didn’t coat my mouth in the bitter taste of disappointment.

“My parents would call that a travesty,” Sahil said, and I frowned at him questioningly. “Oh, they’re big believers in higher education. Both of them teach anthropology at UCCS. They sort of finance the education of one student every year. It’s their mission in life to make higher ed accessible to everyone.”

“That’s so cool,” I said. And crazy that they could do that. My parents couldn’t even afford to put one kid through college.

“Cool, but also a little bit annoying. They want both Neil and me to go into academia. Neil’s one hundred percent on board, but I want to be a film critic, which my dad thinks is just an excuse for me to sit around and watch movies and get paid for it. I mean, he’s not wrong.” We laughed. “But I don’t get why that makes it a less valid profession than his. Anyway, what do your parents do?”

“Um, my dad’s an aide at a center for runaway youth. And my mom’s a substitute teacher. Dadi doesn’t work.”

Sahil didn’t ask why I mentioned my dadi when he asked about parents, which was cool. He got the whole Indian extended-family thing. It was another example of how Sahil saw me in ways other people didn’t.

We began our ascent again, and my stomach dipped uncomfortably. I must’ve made a face because Sahil moved infinitesimally closer to me, the movement seeming completely subconscious. I, on the other hand, was hyperaware that our thighs were just a breath away from each other. My fists balled in my lap.

“And do they support your filmmaking?” he asked, in a way that told me he was trying to take my mind off the fact that we were, once again, floating in the sky in a creaky little metal cage.

But I played along. It helped. “Dadi does. My parents don’t exactly support it, but they don’t not support it either, if that makes sense.”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “It does. It sucks when parents aren’t fully engaged in your stuff, even if it’s so much better than hovering parents.”

I looked up at him again. He was so right. I had cousins in California and Oregon whose parents were basically a subspecies of helicopter, they hovered so much. And that would be super irritating. But having parents who couldn’t care less about what you were up to had its own levels of associated suckage. “Yeah. I know what you mean.”

“You should come to breakfast at my place sometime,” he said suddenly.

I glanced at his flushed face and saw this was a big deal to him. Sahil wasn’t the type of guy to extend frivolous invitations. “Your parents wouldn’t mind?”

“Nah. They’re always telling me to broaden my friendship horizons beyond the same two I’ve had since second grade. Besides, my mom is impressed that you want to be a film director in the … how did she put it? Oh, right, the systematic racial and patriarchal system that has been curated to exclude women and especially women of color.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah.” He smiled fondly. “Mom gets a little bent out of shape about the patriarchy. But I promise they’re fun. And my dad makes the best peanut butter chocolate chip pancakes. Hands down.”

“No kidding?” To be honest, I was curious about Sahil and Neil’s parents. What must they be like to have raised two crushworthy boys? And okay. I was also into the idea of accidentally-on-purpose running into Neil. Maybe we could just talk about all the secret admirer stuff right there and things would finally be clearer. “All right. You’ve convinced me. Just let me know when.”

He grinned, looking relieved. “Awesome.”

The Ferris wheel stopped spinning and I realized we were at the bottom. We’d be getting off in a few short seconds. I felt a lurch of disappointment that my time with Sahil was almost over.

“Wanna go on another ride?” he asked.