My So-Called Bollywood Life(7)
King Khan, the superstar of Bollywood superstars, tore off the mask and lifted an eyebrow in his signature look.
“Why, yes, se?orita, it is I.”
Winnie shoved her billowing hair from her face. “You quoted one of your movies! Not Baazigar, but still one of your movies. This is the best dream of my life.”
Shah Rukh Khan swaggered toward her. “I’ve come to deliver a message to you to relieve your doubt.”
“My doubt of what?”
“Of destiny,” he said. “Because those who fight destiny, who fight what’s written in the stars, always end up having the hardest struggle.”
When she reached his side, he gripped her hand and twirled her in a circle. Her veil floated around her shoulders.
“Well, I don’t like my destiny anymore,” she said when she stopped spinning. “I can change it if I want to. It’s the twenty-first century, Shah Rukh. Not everything is about love anymore. Look at the film industry.”
“You’re right,” he said, and lowered her into a dip. “So are you ready to struggle?”
She was just imagining things because of what Pandit Ohmi said to her that night. None of this was real. But since she was dancing with Shah Rukh Khan and she had nothing to lose, she asked, “You got any advice?”
He pulled her up and in Hindi said, “In life, if you want to become, achieve, or win something, then listen to your heart. If your heart doesn’t say something to you, then close your eyes and take the names of your mother and father like a mantra. Then watch. You’ll achieve everything, and whatever was difficult will become easy. Victory will be yours.”
“Now you’re quoting Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham! That’s the most noncommittal advice ever, Shah Rukh,” she said. Since he was in her dream, she figured she had the right to call him by his first names. “The title of the movie is noncommittal, too. ‘Sometimes Happiness, Sometimes Sadness’? Come on.”
“It works,” he said with another laugh.
“And I’m assuming, since you’re a parent and all, that you’re telling me to listen to my folks. But this is my dream, and I do what I want!”
“You always have, dost.”
Friend.
He let go of her hand and started backing away toward the cliff, and fog began rolling in. Winnie waved at the fog, trying to keep him in sight, but Shah Rukh Khan’s image faded as he slipped into the cloud. The only lingering part of him was his voice.
“Remember, Winnie Mehta, fighting fate never works. I’ve made a career out of proving just how powerful destiny can be.”
* * *
—
Winnie jerked up in bed. She could feel the dampness at her hairline and on her neck.
“Holy baby Shah Rukh Khan,” she whispered. What was she supposed to make of that?
She powered up her laptop, which was sitting on the pillow next to her, and rubbed her eyes, trying to clear her vision. After a few clicks, she squinted at the screen to make out the last few movies she’d streamed.
“Come on, where are you?” she said into the dark. She knew it had been years since she’d watched Baazigar, but she had to have seen Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham recently. When she couldn’t find the movie in her active playlist, she checked her archives.
She hadn’t watched it in ages, either.
So why had she dreamed about it?
There was only one way to find out. She clicked on the movie title and put in her earbuds. With a yawn, she settled in against her pillows, hoping that rewatching the film could help her make sense of what she’d just dreamed.
3
STUDENT OF THE YEAR
High school hallways are always shot in the same way. Groups of people whispering and huddled in corners. Oddly enough, the only thing different from real life is the background music that follows the heroine around like a rain cloud.
The Princeton Academy for the Arts and Sciences was a selective institution that thrived on excellence in acting, dance, music, and film as well as STEM programs. At any given moment, someone could burst into song in the cafeteria, jeté down the hallway, or pull out an AP Physics textbook.
Winnie squeezed through a group of cute-bots wearing leotards and UGGs before she reached her locker. Since the first bell, she had forced herself to be polite, sometimes flippant, sometimes funny about the whole Raj thing. No one thought for a second how much her pride, or even her heart, was hurting. Now she needed a moment to chill, so she concentrated on the collage of her favorite Bollywood actors centered inside her locker door that she’d put together that morning. Her senior year class schedule was pasted above the collage, and a list of upcoming Bollywood and art-house movies were below, followed by her blog review calendar. At the bottom were key film-club event dates she’d scheduled at the end of her junior year with the faculty advisor, Ms. Jackson.
She ran her hand over a random sticky note that had the name of a local movie theater, a date, and the words ’80s movie night along with Say Anything circled in red pen. Bridget’s obsession with eighties movies rivaled her love for Jane Austen, and seeing something other than a Shah Rukh Khan blockbuster was always a great distraction.