One Indian Girl(81)

I turned towards her and interrupted her.

‘What do you mean, even better attitude? I should be more subservient? What is that word in ads? Homely? It just means submissive, right? You want me to be more homely?’

‘Well. Yeah.’

‘I am not homely. So maybe I will just stay single.’

‘Don’t say such horrible things.’

‘There’s nothing horrible about it,’ I said.

‘This money and international job have gone to your head. You are not even a girl anymore.’

‘What?’ I said, one eyebrow up in disgust.

‘Forget it.’

‘Mom, dad used to walk me to the school bus stop, remember? When I was in primary school.’

She looked at me, said nothing.

‘He used to tell me, “Beta, when you grow up, you can do whatever you want. The sky is the limit for you.’’’

‘So?’

‘Why do people tell girls all this? You ask them to achieve things, but when they do, you can’t handle it. Why does it become “you are not even a girl anymore”?’

‘I don’t know all that. I never worked. I didn’t have choices like yours,’ she said.

‘Neither did you have the courage,’ I said.

She paused for a second before she spoke again. ‘I don’t know. Okay, fine, I don’t have courage. Anyway, I think it is better for women if they don’t work.’

‘Mom!’ I screamed in exasperation.

‘What?’

‘My job means a lot to me. Can you not demean it?’

‘Can you not demean me?’ my mother said. She broke into tears. Her sobs turned into a full-blown crying fest, as she mourned the loss of her ten shortlisted prospective sons-in-law.

I looked around. I found a tissue box on the bedside table. I passed it to her. She wiped her tears.

‘Do you know how much pain I had to bear when you were born?’ she said.

It’s called labour, mom. I didn’t cause it, it is how kids happen.

‘I heard you wanted to abort me,’ I said.

She looked up.

‘Who told you?’

‘It’s not important how I found out. I heard the doctor goofed up on the sex determination test. He said it would be a boy.’

My mother looked at me in silence.

‘Those were different times,’ she whispered. ‘We had Aditi. Your dadi wanted a boy.’

‘You did too.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Sorry, mom, I came out. You got a raw deal.’

‘Don’t be stupid. I love you.’

She hugged me and after a moment I hugged her back.

‘Then let me be,’ I said, ‘please. Groom or no groom, doesn’t matter. I want you to support me.’

A tear escaped my eye. I buried my face in mom’s chest.

‘Don’t worry. We will go through some more profiles tomorrow. Your rajkumar will be there somewhere,’ said mom.





35


Three weeks later


My mother wore her reading glasses. She flicked through the pictures on the shaadi.com app on my phone.

‘See this. Why haven’t you accepted this one?’ my mother said.

We sat in my living room at noon on a Saturday morning, I in blue pajamas–white T-shirt and she in a salwar-kameez.

‘Read it out, mom,’ I said, typing on my laptop. ‘What does he do?’

‘He works in Facebook,’ she said, and removed her glasses, surprised. ‘How can you work in Facebook? He does Facebook all day?’

‘No, mom. Facebook is a company. Go on. How old?’

‘Twenty-eight. Height five feet ten inches. I will read his profile?’

‘Sure. He wrote it?’ I said.

‘No, it says written by parent.’

‘That’s two points down.’

‘Stop it. Even I had to write it the first time for you, right?’

‘I will never forget that. Anyway, go on.’

My mother read from the phone screen.



Our son is an intelligent, humble and simple boy who is looking for a suitable life partner. He prefers a career woman, someone who is willing to live in the USA. He is a systems engineer at Facebook, where he has worked for the last five years. He is based in Menlo Park, San Francisco. He did his engineering in Computer Science from NIT Nagpur, where he topped his class. He did his masters from MIT in Boston, USA. He is our only child. We are a simple Punjabi family based in Mumbai (originally from West Delhi). We want the right girl above anything else, as she will be our new family member.



My mother finished reading and reached for a glass of water.

‘Not bad, well-written. Open-minded and honest. Salary?’ I said and pressed save on my laptop.

‘It says between 150,000 to 175,000 USD, plus stock options. Is that good?’

‘Good. Give me the phone.’

I saw his profile picture. A lean, tall and bespectacled man in a beige overcoat stood against the backdrop of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. He resembled Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Google. Geeks have their own role models, I guess.

‘He is handsome,’ my mother said.

‘He looks like the student who tells other children to stop talking.’