One Winter’s Day: A feel-good winter romance

by Laura Briggs

  Tamir glanced back. “He made you go out with me?” he asked slowly.

  She shook her head. “No—just the website thing,” she said. “I went out with you because… well, because my family wanted it… and because you were a nice guy, and I didn’t want to hurt you. Obviously I kind of failed that part,” she added lamely.

  Shaking beneath her coat, she felt both brave and terrible for saying any of this. She stood up straight, making herself look at Tamir with what she hoped was an apology in her eyes… but not any regrets for telling him the truth.

  He released a sigh. “There’s nothing to say, I guess,” he answered at last. “Except that I… I understand what you mean. That is, I know what it’s like to do something for your family’s sake more than your own. It was like that for me too in a way.”

  “Really?” Her heart lifted ever so slightly with these words. “Then you didn’t want to sign up for the match site either?” she guessed. Maybe this wasn’t the crushing blow to his feelings she had feared it would be. He might be a little bit relieved even, somewhere behind that stiff demeanor.

  Tamir hesitated. “It was more my parents’ idea than my own, yes. I was willing to go along with it because they were so eager for it—but I wasn’t sure I was ready for something like that. Or to have a relationship right now,” he added somewhat sheepishly.

  “So why did you keep asking me out?” The question popped from Ama’s mouth before she considered its consequences. If Tamir was truly indifferent to her as a date and only pursued the relationship to please his parents, then it wouldn’t matter much. But if he had started to like her, even a little bit, this could open a can of worms they were better off avoiding.

  He looked embarrassed for a moment. “I liked spending time with you. And I thought we might actually be compatible, given the chance. I suppose I was wrong about that.” His smile was wry but fleeting.

  Compatible. One of Ama’s least favorite terms for describing romantic connections, but exactly the kind she would expect someone like Tamir to choose when describing his ideal relationship.

  “Maybe my first instinct was right, and I wasn’t ready to meet someone yet,” Tamir continued. “Maybe I was trying too hard—or not hard enough. I kept thinking with more time it might work out between us.”

  She hoped he wasn’t holding out for the possibility that she would change her mind. She needed to be clear that it wasn’t going to happen, just in case he thought there might be a chance for them despite this parting. It wouldn’t do to have anybody trapped in wishful thinking.

  “I really am sorry, Tamir,” she told him. “I wish it could have been different, but it isn’t. I don’t think it will change in the future. I can’t keep wasting your time like this.”

  There was a long pause as he absorbed this. After a moment, he nodded. “Thank you,” he said. He looked so grave and serious—then again, he looked that way all the time, so Ama couldn’t be sure how much this was actually hurting him. But his tone was one of acceptance, she thought, after spending time with him these last few weeks.

  “I should go, I suppose,” he said. “I don’t want to keep you here too long. I guess you probably didn’t plan to see the gallery after all tonight.” This time, his glance betrayed a flicker of regret beneath the polite surface.

  So he was hurt. Ama felt worse, seeing the pain in his eyes, but it was too late to change it. Whether it was his pride, dignity, or a deeper feeling that she had wounded, she would probably never know. But it didn’t matter since she had been honest with him, about the fact that one more date or a hundred like the first two wouldn’t change things between them.

  “Thanks for understanding,” she said. “I hope you find the right person next time.” The cheerful rendition of ‘Good King Wenceslas’ in the background didn’t fit this situation at all, even though Tamir managed a weak smile.

  “I hope so, too.” The smile, faint as it was, dissolved entirely as he turned away from her. “Goodbye, Ama.”

  “Goodbye,” she said. “Good luck.” That felt like a stupid farewell line, but she had already said it aloud. Tamir didn’t look back to acknowledge it, however, as he walked away toward the opposite side of the plaza, his guidebook still tucked under his arm.

  Ama sighed and hugged herself in the cold. As hard as it was to tell Tamir the truth, the hardest part was yet to come. How could she tell her family it was finally over between her and the matchmaking site’s suitor?

  “How was your evening?” Bendi shut off the vacuum cleaner as Ama entered the restaurant’s outer foyer. “You are home early.”

  Of course her auntie would be lingering here, waiting for the latest word on Ama’s courtship—she should have expected it from the moment she came downstairs in her coat and scarf after dinner.

  “I didn’t go out to have fun,” she answered, pulling off her scarf. She met Jaidev coming downstairs now.

  “Hey, I thought you had a date tonight,” said Jaidev. “That’s what Dad said.”

  “I did not have a date,” she corrected him.

  “Didn’t you see the boy tonight?” Ranjit appeared from the restaurant doorway, in his slippers and the Indian cotton ensemble that he wore whenever he hosted in the dining room. Behind him, Ama could hear the noise of customers eating, and the crash of a serving dish sliding off the table inside the kitchen.

  “How was the former playboy of Tamil Nadu?” asked Jaidev.

  “Stop it, everybody. Please.” Ama held up her hands. “For the record, I did not have a date tonight. What’s more, I’m not seeing Tamir anymore.”

  You could drop a pin and hear it bounce on the carpet in the second of silence which followed her words—then came the rush of replies, the exclamation of shock from her auntie, the dismay from her father which sounded like a wounded cry.

  “But why?” demanded Ranjit. “Such a perfect boy for you. Ama, why?”

  “He wasn’t, though, Papa,” she insisted. “I told you from the start that it wouldn’t work, and it didn’t. Now it’s over, so everyone can forget about Tamir and me. All right?”

  She turned to finish going upstairs, feeling Jaidev tweak her sleeve. “Nice move, sis,” he whispered. She saw a sympathetic gleam in her brother’s eye as he went below. She could hear her auntie and father’s protests, the words being exchanged about her announcement, but she pretended not to notice.

  Upstairs, she pulled off her scarf and coat and flopped down on her bed. She was supposed to finish making a list of ingredients for the dessert finger foods for Nadia and Lyle’s reception, but she felt too tired to reach for her pencil and pad. Maybe sleep was what she really needed, now that her enthusiasm had drained itself in two confrontations.

  Chop, chop, chop. Ama’s knife diced almonds for the evening’s dessert amidst the morning kitchen’s usual chaos, her mind on the chocolate truffles for the wedding, and the sugared coconut for their coating. Mini snowballs, she pictured—and mini peppermint cheesecakes to the side—

  “Did you want apples for a dessert?” asked Jaidev, setting a sack on the counter. “Somebody said we needed apples, so I ordered a crate from the grocery guy.”

  “I’m using them to make a seasonal version of halwa,” she explained. “Kind of like applesauce.” Her knife slid aside the almonds in tiny piles on her cutting board. She glanced toward the stove, where her father was stirring a pan of chickpeas, looking morose and grumpy.

  He was going to say something about their conversation last night, sooner or later. All morning everyone in the kitchen had given each other little looks when they thought she was busy, refraining from asking only because they thought she wouldn’t tell them what happened. How did she break up with such a great suitor—more precisely, how did she manage to lose such a perfect suitor?

  Her father’s spoon clacked against the side of the pan the way it did when he was upset about something. Pashma looked up from grinding spices. “Let me make the chutney dip,” she said to Ranjit.

  “No
. I want to do it.” A childish tone of declaration—he must really be upset, Ama thought. She tried not to notice as she went back to dicing nuts, the rhythm of her knife matching the soft shoof shoof of her mother’s pestle against the cumin seeds.

  “Maybe there will be another boy,” said Ranjit. “The website ad will last to the end of the month. Maybe there will be another nice date in a week or two.”

  “I’m not meeting another boy from the website, Papa,” said Ama. “I just… can’t. It’s not going to work, so please don’t ask me to do it anymore.”

  “But why? How?” he repeated. “Ama, he was such a good boy—he had a degree, he had a nice job—”

  “He was soo cute,” said Rasha. “Are you sure you want to break up with him?”

  “Who said she broke with him?” Bendi interrupted. “Did she break with him?” She glanced at all of them sharply, as if sniffing for the answer. “Did she?”

  “It was mutual, auntie,” said Ama. “We weren’t meant to be. That’s all. It’s just a fact of life for some people that they’re not meant to be a couple.”

  “So try again,” pressed Ranjit. “There are lots of nice boys on the internet account. Go look—one of them could be the right one. Maybe he writes, maybe he asks to meet you—”

  “Dad, maybe we should let it go,” said Jaidev gently. “Give Ama some time.”

  “She doesn’t need time, she needs a nice boy!” declared Bendi. “Look how long she’s been unattached. Men notice when a girl has been eligible too long.”

  “Not these days, Bendi,” said Rasha. “Nobody cares anymore how long you’ve been single. You should look on the website though, Ama,” she added. “Papa’s right. Some of those guys sound amazing. I remember seeing Sanjay’s profile after we were dating, and thinking ‘wowza.’ I would have totally dated him based on that.”

  “No, thanks.” Ama pushed her latest almond slivers into a new pile.

  “It is the fault of that other boy,” said Ranjit vehemently. “The one with the motorbike. He’s giving you ideas about wild boys being better than sensible ones, and you want to meet someone like him instead of a good boy like Tamir.”

  “That’s not why Tamir and I aren’t dating anymore,” said Ama, with a guilty jolt at how close her father had come to the truth. “We weren’t right for each other, Papa, and that’s that.”

  “Why not?” he asked again. “What did you need that he didn’t have?”

  “I needed to feel something for him,” said Ama. “Can’t you understand just a little? I don’t want to be practical about love, I want it to happen on impulse. I want to feel it happen to me—not try to feel it with someone because they’re a suitable person, or we have a few things in common.”

  He shook his head. “A good boy shows up, you say no. I don’t know what I’m going to do. You will choose some terrible boy and what can I do about it? What can I do, Ama?”

  “You think a boyfriend I choose would be so awful that you could never like him?” she answered. “Is that what you think of me?” She was shocked and hurt, although it made sense, really. He didn’t trust her, and that’s why he wanted her to choose from a pool of candidates where he decided who was and wasn’t acceptable.

  “He didn’t mean it like that, Ama.” Rasha laid a hand soothingly on her sister’s arm, but Ama shook it off.

  “I think stupid movies and books have filled up your head,” answered Ranjit. “Filled it with ideas about love that are not real. You think that boys should be like the princes and spies and—and superheroes—and that suitors should make long speeches and kiss you under the stars. Things are not like that in real life, Ama. But you will pick a boy who makes you think they are, and he will do it to trick you. That’s what I know as your papa, and that’s why I should be the one to decide these things for my children.”

  He clanked his spoon angrily against the side of the pan, as if the end of his speech should be the end of the matter. Ama’s eyes burned with tears, although she didn’t let them fall.

  “It’s not like that anymore, though,” said Rasha. “You know that, Papa. Even Punjabi women in India can pick which matches they’re going to date. Mama picked you, didn’t she? She had other suitors who liked her, right?”

  “In America, everybody does it like this nowadays,” said Jaidev. “This is how all of our friends do it—they meet somebody, go out with them, have a good time, and marry them if they’re a good person they like.”

  “That’s not a good way,” muttered Ranjit. Ama pulled off her apron and marched out of the kitchen.

  He was never going to understand. She didn’t expect him to, but couldn’t he at least let her be herself? Couldn’t he forget about Tamir and the website for a while—and try to believe that she wasn’t a stupid person who believed in unicorns and fairy godmothers?

  She pushed aside the sketches on her bed and sat on its end, struggling not to feel angry or hurt. The door to her room opened again—she expected to see Rasha or Jaidev, come to offer a little private sympathy, but it was Pashma instead.

  “I’ll come down in a moment, Mama,” she said. “I want a few minutes to be alone.” She didn’t want another lecture on why being a good daughter meant making decisions that were based on what your family wanted. Or some such speech, like the ones that came when she and her siblings argued for holidays away from the family, or over what to do with extra profits from the restaurant.

  Drawing aside her sari’s free end, Pashma sat down on the bed beside Ama. “Your papa isn’t angry with you,” she said.

  “What is he, then? Disappointed?” Ama asked.

  “You are his last daughter. He’s protecting you,” said Pashma. “Once you are gone, he has no one to look after but me and your auntie… and there is only the one of us he wants to look after, we both know.”

  Ama almost smiled at this remark, but her unhappiness was stronger than that urge.

  “Give him time. He will forget to be upset about the boy in a few days,” said Pashma.

  “But not about me,” said Ama. “This isn’t just about Tamir, Mama. You know that.” A sigh of frustration escaped her, as her mother’s arm tucked itself around her shoulders.

  “I remember when you were six,” Pashma said. “You drew the picture in school of what your life would be someday. You wanted to put it on the fridge box like all your friends did, by the list for the market.”

  “Did I?” said Ama listlessly. Another story about the past, to make her appreciate family warmth or security, probably. She didn’t remember this particular picture herself, lost in a mental box of a hundred or so grade school art assignments.

  “It was a picture of you standing on a beach. You had a little bucket and a little shovel, and a big castle made of sand,” said her mother. “You told us that it was your dream castle.”

  “I hadn’t learned to love cakes and cookies yet,” said Ama. “It was too early for that dream to be reality.” Maybe the point was that her dreams changed; and so, her dream might change to be that of a girl happy to have her father screen all potential boyfriends through a matchmaking site for Indian singles.

  “I remember that picture, because it was different from the ones that your brothers and sisters drew,” said Pashma. “I saw it was, even then.”

  “Jaidev’s pictures always had race cars,” said Ama. “Rasha probably drew fashion models.”

  “It wasn’t the dream that was different.” Pashma shook her head. “All the others had everybody in the picture with them, standing beside them. But not you,” she continued. “You drew yourself only. You saw your life as separate. As something that was your own. You thought about your dream for you when they told you to draw it, and that’s what you did. That’s how I knew that you were not the same as all the others.”

  “What do you mean?” Ama wiped away the traces of her tears. “You mean more American, right? More love for fast food pizza and Nickelback CDs.” Her mother didn’t know who Nickelback were, of course. Then ag
ain, neither did the seventeen-year-old clerk at the corner mart when she had picked up a copy of their Greatest Hits out of nostalgia recently.

  “Rasha was the wildflower that wanted to bloom and be pretty. Nalia was the obedient one. Nikil wanted his own place outside the home, and Jaidev can never be serious about life. But you are, Ama,” said Pashma. “I know that you are. And I know that you are not trying to hurt your family when you say you are different.”

  “What are you saying, Mama?” Ama was dangerously close to crying again, but for different reasons from before.

  “You are a good daughter,” said Pashma solemnly. “You are a smart girl who knows what you can and cannot do. I will trust you, and we will see what we will see.”

  She drew Ama closer, and kissed her forehead. “Come down and finish your almonds,” she said, rising to her feet. “We have only a few hours until we open, and customers will want some halwa after a big plate of spicy food.”

  Ama nodded. “I’ll be down in a minute.” She retrieved a tissue from her bedside drawer and wiped her eyes, then checked to make sure they didn’t look red in the reflection of her compact mirror before she tucked it back inside. From the back of the drawer as she pushed it closed, two old worn crayons in faded paper wraps rolled into view, a green and a purple one, which came to rest against a package of cupcake toppers and a lone birthday cake candle.

  It was almost like a sign, Ama thought, her mother’s story about her childhood drawing still fresh in her mind. A sign that maybe some things can be different when you least imagine it’s possible.

  Twenty-Two

  “How does it feel?” Natalie asked, leaning back on her heels as Nadia twirled in front of the mirror.

  “It feels fantastic,” she said. She laughed as she faced her reflection again in the mirror in Natalie’s workroom. “Oh my gosh. It’s so perfect. The sketch you showed me after you bought the replacement fabric was gorgeous and it looked great during all the fittings—but I didn’t know it would look this amazing when it was finished.”