thing, living here on a day-to-day basis was impossible. I didn’t want to live close to my family anymore. I had been in Thatha’s house just a few hours and I was already seething with feminine rage over half a dozen things.
I wanted to distance myself from India and my family; I wanted to feel nothing, pretend this was happening to someone else, not me; but I couldn’t. I knew these people and they knew me; however dark and ugly it might get, I would still know them and they me. There was no delusional escape, this was the here and now, and whether I liked it or not, I was here now.
“I told him,” I murmured softly.
Neelima wanted Ammamma and Thatha’s approval but she was never going to get it, not complete and total approval. For that she would have to die and come back as a Telugu Brahmin. I felt sorry for her even as I felt annoyance. Why was she here? If Nick’s family treated me the way Ammamma and Thatha treated Neelima, I would give Nick hell and make sure I didn’t deal with his family.
As it was, Nick’s family was wonderful. Whenever we went to visit them in Memphis, they were all hugs and acceptance. When I went with Nick the first time, it was for Thanksgiving and I was very nervous. What if they didn’t like me? I was an Indian and I wondered if they would hate me for that as my parents would hate Nick for being American.
Nick’s mother didn’t care about my ethnicity but she was undoubtedly fascinated by my Indianness. When we met for the first time she told me, “I’ve never spoken to an Indian before, but I love curry.”
And over curry powder and turkey, Nick’s mother— Frances—and I became friends. She was an adorable woman who always remembered my birthday and sent me a gift, something she knew I wanted. She would investigate, harass Nick for information and try to find out from conversations with me what I wanted and then she would ensure that the birthday gift reached me wrapped and packed and on the mark. She always talked about our “impending” wedding and changed the reception dinner menu regularly—her way of asking us to hurry up and tie the knot and of course give her grandchildren.
Nick’s father had died five years ago and from what Nick told me about him, I was sorry to have not met him. He used to be a high school football coach and apparently never held a grudge when Nick became an accountant and his brother, Doug, a sous-chef in New Orleans.
“He used to joke that we were sissies,” Nick said when I asked him about his father. “I miss him. He never told us what to do. I think if I wanted to be a ballet dancer, Dad would have called me a sissy and then would have driven me to ballet lessons.”
Frances had called me before I came to India. “Tell them you’re pregnant. They’ll want you to marry my Nick right away, ” she joked when I told her that I was more than a little nervous about telling my family about Nick.
“So what did your Thatha say about the baby?” Neelima asked demurely.
“Nothing,” I replied, and sat down cross-legged, my right hand still inside the pink bucket. “Why do you keep coming here, Neelima?” I asked bluntly, and her eyes met mine with shock.
“Priya!” Sowmya gasped.
I shook my head and put my hand on the cloth and made a yellow handprint. “I didn’t mean it that way, ” I said finally. “I mean, they treat you . . . well, they treat you like they don’t like you.”
“How will they like her if they don’t know her?” Sowmya jumped to Neelima’s defense.
“Do you really believe that knowing her will make them like her?” I asked slightly irritated. “Anand keeps sending her here and they . . . they don’t want to like her, Sowmya.”
Neelima sniffled and we both turned our attention to her. Lord! Did the woman have to cry? I disliked women who cried incessantly over one thing or the other. Neelima had been bawling or on the verge of doing so ever since I met her.
“Come, come,” Sowmya nudged her sister-in-law with her elbow because both her hands were drenched in turmeric.
“Crying is not going to solve your problem,” I admonished, and they both looked like two little puppies I had kicked with high-heeled boots.