toward Wesley.
“It’s so nice to meet you,” Wesley said.
We handed Bishakha the homemade double-chocolate crinkle cookies and flowers we brought for her.
“Oh yeah! Thank you! I’m so glad you could come. I’m really so happy to see you. Please sit down. Are you guys hungry?” she said. Her voice was sharp. I wondered when was the last time she had received any gifts from anybody.
Bishakha began preparing lunch. She had made my favorite mustard fish curry from when I was a child. I was struck by how empty her apartment looked: There was barely any art on the walls, and some shelves had nothing on them. There were no pictures of Sattik or me, or anyone at all. It was almost like no one had been here for months. My childhood piano was still there.
Her apartment had two bedrooms. I remember visiting once when she first moved here, probably around five years prior. There was a cozy porch where Bishakha said she read books. She also said she often took walks around the neighborhood for exercise.
“Oh Sopan, can you do me a favor?” I heard Bishakha say from the kitchen. “Remember my phone? It’s an old phone number?”
I wasn’t sure what she meant.
“What do you need me to do?” I said.
“Change the voicemail with a new number. Please?” my mother said.
Bishakha’s home phone voicemail was my voice talking about an old phone number. She had never changed it because I don’t think she knew how. We did it for her. Bishakha insisted that Wesley’s voice should greet her callers now. So Wesley, along with a plethora of other talents, became a voiceover artist.
“It’s a little spicy, isn’t it?” Bishakha said, doting on Wesley as we began to eat in her dining room. Wesley and I sat on one side of the table, with my mother on the opposite.
“It’s really good,” Wesley said.
“You like it?” Bishakha beamed.
“Mmhmm.” Wesley nodded.
Bishakha kept bringing out plates of food. There was enough to feed an entire Little League team in one sitting.
“He doesn’t come at all. So, you know, I want him to eat something I cook,” Bishakha said, referring to me. “Of course, you’re coming and I want you to eat too. I wasn’t sure if you’d like the food I cook. I don’t cook these days at all. I’m by myself. I really don’t have to cook.”
“It’s really good, Mom. You haven’t lost your touch,” I answered, looking down at my plate.
At first, lunch was a bit like those Saturday Night Live sketches with Will Ferrell, where he plays a middle manager who yells at his family about owning a Dodge Stratus. One of the brilliant comic bits of the skit is that there are long pockets of silence punctuated solely by the sound of utensils loudly clattering against plates. The rest of the sketch is filled with mundane small talk.
Wesley and I told Bishakha about a recent trip to Charleston to visit Wesley’s family, when I went fishing for the first time. We talked about Wesley’s cooking skills and how she sets off the fire alarm every time she makes a meal. Bishakha said she knew her next-door neighbor who was “very nice.”
“Rest of them, they aren’t very friendly,” she said.
More clattering. I sampled the shrimp.
“You should come time to time to have my food. Then I can cook again,” Bishakha said.
Wesley and I took another serving. I was going to need another run in the morning.
“So you have an iPad?” I asked.
“I like it. My computer is gone,” Bishakha answered. She said her laptop had stopped working about five years ago. But she didn’t like reading books on the iPad because she liked physically touching book pages.
Bishakha glanced at Wesley. Her next question made me flinch for a split second.
“Can I ask a personal question, if you don’t mind? How did you meet Sopan?” Bishakha said.
She had never shown this level of interest in a significant other of mine. Recall that when I approached her with my sixth grade romance, she laughed it off and then we never discussed women again. She had met Michelle, my college girlfriend, once over a similar lunch in 2011. It was awkward. They didn’t click, through nobody’s fault. No one really knew how to act, including me. Neither of us were ready to open ourselves up. I didn’t realize until now that introducing parents to a significant other does require willingness, acceptance, and transparency.
Here Bishakha was, in front of someone with whom I’m romantically involved,