There's Something About Sweetie

by Sandhya Menon

  “Yes, yes, parrots,” Gita Kaki said testily, waving her hand, as if they were the difficult ones. Then she sat forward, her eyes gleaming. “See, unlike carrier pigeons, they wouldn’t need to be trained to carry anything. Not to mention the money people would save on paper and ink! Do you know why?”

  Ashish had a million questions. Why were they suddenly talking about this, for cripes’ sake? Why did Gita Kaki think bird courier services were making a comeback? Was this some sort of hipster trend for the elderly? But he stuck with the simplest response. “No. Um, why?” He didn’t dare look at Sweetie.

  “Because you could just train the parrots to say whatever the message was! You know, ‘happy birthday,’ ‘happy anniversary,’ ‘happy, er, Doughnut Day,’ what have you!” She cackled happily. Then, snapping her attention to Ashish, she said, “Ashish. What’s that song you kids all like?”

  He stared at her. “Um …”

  “The song, the song!” she said, getting irritated. Oh God. This was going to turn into an even bigger circus.

  “Oh, um, ‘Happy Birthday’?” Ashish said, grasping at straws.

  “No, not ‘Happy Birthday’!” Gita Kaki said, agitated. “Oh, I know! ‘Macarena’! Sing that for me, Ashish. Sing it!”

  “Gita Kaki, I have no idea what song that i—”

  “Now, Ashish! Sing it!” she yelled, clapping her hands kind of savagely.

  He stared at her. And then he started to sing. “Um … we all go to the Macarena … um, woo-hoo …”

  A strange snorting sound emanated from Sweetie. Ashish darted a glance at her and noticed she was holding her glass of juice in front of her mouth and looking steadfastly down at the carpet.

  Gita Kaki waved him off. “That’s not ‘Macarena’!” she said dismissively.

  Of course it’s not freaking “Macarena”; I don’t know what that is! Ashish wanted to say. But Gita Kaki was already talking to Sweetie. “You see, Sweetie, even a complex song like that could be taught to the right parrot! They’re so intelligent!”

  Sweetie nodded politely, though Ashish could see the sparkle in her eye. Oh, man. He was going to catch so much crap for this later. “So are you going to start up a courier business, then? With the parrots?”

  What? What? Why was she asking that? Why was she encouraging it?

  “I’m so happy you asked, Sweetie!” Gita Kaki said, jumping up and going over to a rolltop desk in the corner.

  Ashish turned to her and widened his eyes. “Don’t,” he mouthed.

  She shrugged, like, What?

  What did she mean, what? Wasn’t it obvious what? But it was too late to say anything because Gita Kaki was coming back with two pocket folders. She handed one to Ashish and the other to Sweetie. “There,” she said. “Now, that’s everything you need to get started.”

  Ashish was too afraid to ask. He opened the folder instead and saw a flyer inside with a giant picture of a bright-green parrot in the center.

  Your Guide to Getting Started as a Parrot Trainer!

  In just six short weeks, your parrots will be ready to deliver messages around the country! Make $$$$ from the comfort of your own home! A simple investment of $6,000—

  Ashish shut the folder. Without looking at Sweetie, he reached over and took her folder too. “Um, thank you, Gita Kaki. We’ll give these a closer look when we get home,” he said. “And, um, now I was wondering if we could see the parrots. You know, to see their … training potential.”

  “Yes!” Smiling full throttle at him for the first time since she realized he wasn’t Rishi, Gita Kaki stood and led the way to the back room.

  “She actually has the parrots here?” Sweetie whispered as they followed at a safe distance.

  “Don’t ask questions,” Ashish said, sighing. “They’ll just open the doorway to Bizarro World, and you definitely don’t want to take a trip there. Believe me.”

  Laughing, Sweetie held up her hands in surrender.

  This was the most hilarious thing that had ever happened. Not just to her, but, like, in the history of time. Ashish the sweet, handsome, vulnerable, angsty jock had a great-aunt who wanted to enlist them in a pyramid scheme. With message-delivering parrots. Sweetie snorted again and then covered it up by coughing loudly. The look Ashish tossed her told her he didn’t buy it one bit.

  The only thing she didn’t get was why Ashish wanted to see these parrots. He obviously wanted Gita Kaki to shut up about the whole thing. Shouldn’t he be discouraging her completely and changing the subject?

  But before she could ask, Gita Kaki had stopped in front of a closed door and was waiting for them to catch up. They hurried down the hallway just as a phone began to ring. One hand on the doorknob, she said, “Now, Ashish, I am trusting you with these precious babies. Okay?”

  “Yes, Gita Kaki,” he said solemnly, but Sweetie could hear the jubilation fizzing under his words at the thought of her leaving them. “I’ll be very careful.”

  “And respectful,” Gita Kaki added. Then she waited. After a pause, during which the three of them just stared at one another, she said sternly, “Repeat it, Ashish.”

  “And, um, respectful,” Ashish said in a tone that implied, I wish you and your stupid parrots would fly out the window in a cloud of green feathers and leave me alone forever.

  Gita Kaki nodded once, opened the door a tad, and then hurried off in the direction of the ringing phone.

  Ashish breathed a sigh of relief. “Good God, I thought she’d never leave.”

  Sweetie smiled. “What? I kind of like her.”

  He threw her a look, and then they walked into the room. The first thing Sweetie noticed was the odor. It was sort of chalky and pungent, and she screwed up her nose.

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot how bad they smell,” Ashish said, going to open a window.

  It was then that Sweetie realized what, exactly, she was looking at. It was a large room, with row upon row upon row of birdcages, each of them filled with two or three parrots. Most of them were bright green, but some of them had gorgeous, multicolored feathers—vivid reds and peacock blues and brilliant, happy yellows. They were all looking at her, cocking their heads and quietly squawking.

  “Wow. These are so cool,” Sweetie said, moving closer to take a look at them. “There must be, like, fifty here.”

  “Fifty-six, to be exact,” Ashish said, turning back to her. “She’s had some of these for more than twenty years. They’re like her kids; each one has a name, and she insists they all have distinctive personalities, too.”

  “That’s amazing,” Sweetie breathed, reaching out to stroke one of the cage bars. “It’s kind of sad that they have to live caged, though.”

  “It is,” Ashish said. “But maybe they’re happy like that. Maybe they don’t even know what they’re missing because this is all they’ve known.”

  Sweetie straightened and looked at him. They studied each other in silence.

  And then one of the parrots in the cage behind them, a big, beefy one, screeched, “FEED ME, DAMMIT!”

  Sweetie jumped and spun around. The parrot stared at her with its beady eyes. Clapping a hand over her mouth, she began to laugh. “Oh. My. God. Did that bird just curse at me?”

  Ashish laughed. “Yeah, that’s Crabby. He’s been like that for as long as I can remember. No food for you yet, Crabby,” he said to the bird. “You need to wait your turn.”

  “BALLS!” the bird yelled, and Sweetie began to snort helplessly again.

  Ashish chuckled. “Yeah, he’s hilarious until you keep getting woken up at night because you’re spending summer break here and you share a wall with him.”

  Sweetie wiped her eyes. “Oh my God. A deranged parrot. This just keeps getting better.”

  Ashish walked up to her and her smile faded. When he was just a hair’s breadth away from her, he took her chin in his hand. “Being with you can’t really get any better.”

  Sweetie smiled up at him before standing on tiptoes and kissing him softly. “What
about now?” she whispered against his mouth.

  His arms tightened around her waist, and he pulled her snugly against him. She felt something very interesting against her hip, and her heart fluttered. He wanted her. He wanted her as much as she wanted him.

  “GET A ROOM!” Crabby said behind them, and they flew apart.

  “Okay, that’s new,” Ashish said. “Stupid third wheel.”

  Sweetie sputtered a laugh. “Technically, he’s one of fifty-six wheels,” she pointed out. “Speaking of, why are we in here? I thought the whole parrot pyramid scheme was giving you the heebies.”

  “Oh, it was,” Ashish said, raising his eyebrows. “She’s always been eccentric, but that was the first time she’s tried to enlist me in one of her harebrained ideas.” He shook his head. “Anyway, I have something to show you. Or, I guess, ask you.”

  “Oh yeah?” She smiled, pleased. There were few things as exciting as surprises. “What’s that?”

  But instead of answering her, Ashish raised his hands and clapped three times.

  Sweetie could hardly keep up with what happened next. There was immediate and cacophonic squawking. It took her a moment to realize the parrots were speaking English words.

  “With! With!” one in the corner squawked.

  “To!” a multicolored one behind her said.

  “You!” a third one screamed after a pause.

  “Me!”

  “Go!”

  “Stop!” Ashish yelled, clutching his hair. “You stupid birds! Stop!”

  “Will!” a parrot behind him said into the following short silence, almost defiantly.

  “With!” the first one said again.

  “You already said that!” Ashish yelled. “Stop it! What are you doing?”

  “Damn! Hell! Stop!” Crabby chorused, invigorated by the panic in Ashish’s voice.

  Sweetie began to laugh. “What is going on?”

  “You!” the one parrot screamed again.

  “Me!”

  “To!”

  Sweetie’s stomach hurt. Tears began to stream down her cheeks, she was laughing so hard. “What … what are they doing, Ashish?” she asked when she could breathe.

  Ashish studied her for a moment, his expression livid. Then, seeing her bent over helplessly, he began to laugh too. “The idiotic birds were supposed to ask you to—”

  “Prom!” one of the birds said. “Prom! Prom!”

  Ashish shrugged. “Yeah, that.” He turned to the last bird. “Thank you, Petey. Very helpful.”

  Prom. This was about prom. “You’re asking me to prom?”

  “Your prom,” Ashish clarified. “I’ve, ah, been suspended from Richmond’s proms for some shenanigans last year, so that’s kind of our only option.” Sighing, he added, “Anyway, these annoying hellbirds were supposed to help me ask you. In a very orderly fashion. I spent all last Sunday afternoon training them, and Gita Kaki assured me she was keeping up with it throughout the week. Which, I don’t know. What else did I expect, right? Total train wreck.”

  “At least I know where Gita Kaki got her inspiration for that whole courier-services thing.”

  Ashish groaned and covered his face with his hands.

  Smiling, Sweetie stepped closer to him and gently moved his hands off his face. Circling her arms around his narrow waist, she said, “By the way, this isn’t a train wreck. It’s the most romantic thing ever.”

  “Seriously?” Ashish cocked an eyebrow. “Oh, right. I forgot I’m your first boyfriend; the bar’s pretty low.”

  She laughed and slapped him on the chest, reveling in the way her hand bounced off the muscle there. And the way he’d casually called himself her boyfriend. They were boyfriend and girlfriend. Ashish Patel was her boyfriend. She tried not to squeal in pure, giddy glee. “Seriously. This is the sweetest, most adorable thing I’ve ever heard of. Thank you.” She’d never even dreamed she’d get a promposal from a boy at all (or, technically, from a parrot), let alone a boy as perfect as Ashish, or one into which the boy had put so much effort.

  He kissed her on the nose. “So?” he said softly, those honey eyes melting her bones, turning her blood to lava. “Sweetie Nair, will you go with me to prom?”

  She gazed up at him through the fringe of her eyelashes. “Yes, Ashish Patel,” she whispered. “I’ll go with you to prom.”

  Smiling broadly, he leaned down and kissed her. And that, among the smelly, squawking, unbalanced parrots, was the most romantic moment in Sweetie Nair’s life.

  Ashish held her close, his heart leaping with joy. She really did love his madcap promposal; he could see in her eyes that he’d pulled it off somehow. And right on the heels of that joy came the nagging guilt, because he still hadn’t told her everything about Celia. She’d see why he had to do it this way, though, right? Ashish desperately hoped she would. He might be a little thick when it came to love, but one thing was clear even to him: If Celia leaving him had broken his heart, Sweetie breaking up with him would pulverize it to nothing.

  CHAPTER 26

  They spent another couple of hours eating lunch and visiting with Gita Kaki and left shortly after that. Neither Ashish nor she was in any hurry to stick around and hear more about Gita Kaki’s mad scheme to take over the world with tropical birds.

  “But are you sure she doesn’t have, like, dementia?” Sweetie said as they got into the elevator. “That’s a serious thing, you know.”

  Ashish laughed and squeezed her hand. “I’m sure. She’s been like that since I was a little kid. She’s just … different. She has no problems taking care of herself, though, believe me.”

  “Or her parrots,” Sweetie said. “Can we come back and visit her soon?”

  “You have to be joking.”

  “I’m not,” Sweetie protested as they got out of the elevator and walked to the Porsche. “She seems lonely, and I think she really liked us visiting her. Plus, I feel like we really hit it off with Crabby. Maybe next time we could even bring Dimple and Rishi.”

  Ashish threw an arm around her shoulder and pulled her to him. She snuggled in against his warm body. “You are the literal sweetest, you know that?” After kissing her on the top of her head, he continued. “Yes, I guess we can come visit her soon. But let’s give it, I don’t know, like, six months?”

  She smiled happily. “Sure.”

  Ashish took her face in his big hands, and her heart sped up as she looked into those eyes. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” she breathed back, her muscles going all liquidy.

  He smoothed a curl off her forehead. “I really like you, Sweetie Nair.”

  Her heart did a couple of somersaults in her chest. “You really like me?” This moment was like winning the lottery on her birthday while eating Amma’s pal payasam. She was afraid to blink, just in case she woke herself up and this whole thing turned out to be a dream. A very, very, very nice dream.

  “Obviously,” Ashish said, his cocky smirk back.

  He paused. The cocky smile disappeared, replaced by vulnerability. He blinked and looked away before meeting her eyes again. “Do you … do you feel the same way?”

  He was actually unsure, Sweetie realized with wonder. He seriously didn’t know the effect he had on her. He had no idea how hard she’d fallen, how hard she continued to fall every single moment they were together. But she couldn’t say all of that. She didn’t want to freak him out too early in their relationship. “Obviously,” she said instead, grinning.

  He smiled then, jubilant and bright. Stroking her dimple with his thumb, he leaned down and planted the softest, sweetest kiss on her lips. “Then I’m the luckiest guy on the planet.”

  Sweetie didn’t even remember the drive home (which was fine, since Ashish drove). She was fairly sure the Porsche carried them through the clouds, though, and that they never touched the ground at all.

  The whole Richmond gang (plus Samir) were hanging out on the balcony at Ashish’s place Wednesday night. Myrna had brought them out some fresh-squeezed lemo
nade, and she’d opened the umbrellas placed at the various clusters of sofas and tables so they could all just lounge around and “study for finals.” Really they were just shooting the breeze, drunk on that end-of-the-school-year exhilaration.

  Well, most of them were drunk on the exhilaration. Oliver and Elijah looked like they were being led to a dinner date with Hannibal Lecter. Neither of them had so much as looked at the other, let alone said a civil word or two. Ashish could feel the tension crackling between them. He didn’t get too close, in case he got zapped like those poor bugs in those … whatever they were called. Bug zapper thingies.

  “Yo, Dreamland,” Pinky called from across the balcony. She was sitting on a little settee with Elijah, and Samir was across from them, his nose buried in some comic. He didn’t have the same final exam anxiety they had, being homeschooled. On the flip side, he didn’t really have that end-of-year exhilaration, either. When your home was also your school, it sort of sucked the joy out of summer break. “I’m talking to you.”

  Ashish blinked. “Sorry, I couldn’t understand you with that thing in your lip.” Pinky had gotten her lower lip pierced last weekend at some hippie forest festival, to her parents’ complete horror. The fact that it glowed in the dark—something she liked to boast about at random intervals—did not help the situation.

  “Har, har,” she said, though it was obvious that she had trouble speaking with it in. Not that Pinky would ever admit to making a mistake like that, especially one that vexed her parents so much. “We were talking about Band Night at Roast Me tomorrow. Are we all going together or what?”

  Ashish darted an uncomfortable glance at Oliver. “Um, yeah, I could drive you guys in the Escalade.”

  “I’ll just meet you guys there,” Oliver said immediately, without looking up from his biology textbook.

  “There’s plenty of room,” Elijah said stiffly from the settee.

  “I know how much room there is, thanks,” Oliver replied equally stiffly.