My Last Love Story

by Falguni Kothari

  “Is that what you’ve been doing on the nights you don’t come to bed?” The borderline accusation in my question gave me pause. I sounded jealous, like a shrew-wife pissed off at her husband for spending more time with his mistress than herself.

  It had been my job to sort out the photos, and I hadn’t done it. It was my job to make my husband happy and comfortable, and I wasn’t managing that either. Couldn’t I do anything right?

  Nirvaan gave me a sharp glance but chose not to answer. He groped for the tablet hidden beneath the blanket and switched it on before handing it to me. The pictures hadn’t only been uploaded but sorted, dated, and organized into albums, too. He’d even made movies from some.

  A funny, fluttery thing awoke inside me when I tapped an album titled, Jab We Met. The title was stolen from a blockbuster Bollywood rom-com. The album, not the movie, was about the summer the three of us had met. I’d fallen asleep thinking of that summer. It sometimes spooked me how in sync Nirvaan and I were, how in sync all three of us were.

  The first picture was of us blowing candles on a giant chocolate cake. I looked dazed, which accounted for my total memory loss about this part of the night. I couldn’t remember cutting the cake even though the picture was irrefutable proof that I had, and from the looks of the subsequent photos, I’d enjoyed smashing some of it on the guys’ faces.

  “My Frooti was spiked. It had to be,” I declared, yet again in defense of my actions.

  Nirvaan pleaded the fifth, as usual.

  I frowned into my empty mug. “I need more coffee if we’re going to rehash our lives, one picture at a time.”

  Rehashing the past was on the Wish List, too. Nirvaan wished to recount and relive every moment of his life. He was creating a slide show to play at our birthday bash and wanted to make sure he didn’t forget a single person or event he was grateful for. I found the whole idea unnecessarily Hallmark-ish and morbid. Plus, you couldn’t really sieve the good moments out without stirring up the bad.

  But it wasn’t my biopic, was it? I snorted, thinking if I ever got sentimental enough to create one, mine would play out in five pictures flat. Okay, maybe six.

  “Wait. It’s almost light, baby.” Nirvaan tipped me onto his lap when I half-rose from the lounger to get more coffee.

  I usually had two mugs before breakfast.

  So, I waited, shifting to get comfortable against my husband’s chest. His arms came around me along with the blanket, and I felt warm even though I hadn’t been cold in my thick flannel robe and woolen socks. My husband warmed me from the inside out. He always had.

  I raised the tablet high and took a picture of us.

  “Dawn of the Dead,” said Nirvaan, critiquing my handiwork when I showed it to him.

  I ignored the fact that he was right. “Shut up. You’re ruining the mood.” I clicked another one. It was an improvement, and with a bit of photo editing, we wouldn’t appear so insipid. There.

  Not to be outdone, the sun rose majestically somewhere behind us, and in a never-ending flash, it brought the sea, the beach, and the gulls in front of us into the light.

  For all its ugliness, the world was a beautiful place.

  I didn’t think I’d ever tire of watching a sunrise. I knew I’d never forget the feel of my husband’s arms around me. And though I wanted a second cup of coffee quite badly, I stayed put until Nirvaan’s stomach gurgled against my back.

  We started another day on a laugh.

  Pleased and heart-happy, I stood up and made my way back into the kitchen where the coffee machine diligently refilled my mug. I propped the tablet on the counter and set it to display a slide show, grinning fondly at a picture of the Shaitans of Surat, piled one behind the other on a bright yellow Vespa, blasting hapless pedestrians with cold masala milk from cheap plastic pistols. I had been the instigator and the driver of the Masala Milk Adventure. It’d been my scooter, after all.

  Just as I began to prep for a batch of semolina veggie waffles, the house phone rang. We’d installed a landline, as cell phone reception was a bit wonky in some parts of the house. My cell worked only near the front door and in the kitchen.

  “Hello?” I chirped into the cordless instrument, sandwiching the phone’s receiver between my ear and shoulder. I pulled out peppers, carrots, peas, and stuff from the fridge, keeping one eye on the slide show. I wondered suddenly if Nirvaan had included Sandwich Anu’s pictures in the album. I was not going to be a happy beach bunny if he’d dared.

  “Hello?” I repeated with impatience into the static silence of the phone. It was too early for telemarketers, so I checked the caller ID. London codes. Crap. It was too much to hope that it would be one of Zayaan’s sisters or work people and not his mother.

  “Simeen, I’m trying to reach Zayaan. He’s not answering his mobile. Is Nirvaan okay?”

  The softly anxious voice had the same hair-raising effect on my nerves as a live telecast of a terrorist beheading. Forget Sandwich Anu. Gulzar Begum Ali Mohammed Khan was the true bane of my existence. And there was no way Nirvaan hadn’t uploaded her photograph into the tablet.

  I closed my eyes and counted to ten. I would not let her ruin my day.

  “He’s peachy, Gulzar Auntie. Zayaan dua bole che, so his phone might be off.”

  I didn’t add that she should’ve checked the time difference between England and California before calling us at the crack of dawn. It wouldn’t have gone down well if I had. Zayaan’s mother did not like me and was civil to me only because her son would stand for nothing less. I reciprocated in kind for the same reason and because my mother had taught me to be polite to my elders—even bigoted, rude ones who’d raised a monster and let him loose in the world.

  It was Zayaan’s father who’d adored me, approved of me—in as much as a pillar of the Khoja community could approve of a non-Muslim girl his son had brought home one day. I didn’t know if I would’ve converted to Islam had things worked out the way we’d planned. I knew Zayaan had expected me to when we talked of marriage. Aga Khani Muslims were a liberal lot, and for the most part, they followed very different customs and weren’t considered real Muslims. But Zayaan’s mother belonged to a staunch branch of Sunni Khojas, and to please her, her family had strictly practiced certain Islamic customs.

  I’d sometimes imagine myself married to Zayaan because that would mean that night had not happened. I’d sometimes imagine my parents were alive. They would’ve approved of Zayaan but not of a religious conversion. They would’ve adored Nirvaan. My parents, devoted Parsis though they were, had been broad-minded people. Bottom line, they would’ve wanted me to be happy.

  A sigh shuddered out of my mouth. It was pointless to think about the past, but I couldn’t seem to escape it. Maybe Nirvaan was right with this slide-show business. Maybe we were the sum total of our memories…and fantasies.

  “Have him call me when he’s finished praying.” Zayaan’s mother’s exasperated voice broke through my musings.

  She’d been talking, but I’d tuned her out.

  I peered through the patio doors. Zayaan’s eyes were open, his head turned to one shoulder. He was almost done, but I held my tongue.

  “Of course,” I said, preparing to hang up.

  “How are you, beta?” she asked before I could.

  Compassion rang in her voice, and her use of the endearment beta, or child, rendered me speechless.

  I wanted to smack her down with a flippant, Oh, I’m peachy, too. So looking forward to widowhood. Any tips on how to get on?

  But I forced the bitchiness back into my intestines. “I’m fine. Thank you,” I answered instead.

  How dare she. How dare she offer sympathy now when she never had before. How dare she call me beta in that sickly sweet tone.

  Zayaan’s mother had a knack for making me feel like shit, but I’d strive to be polite for my own mother’s sake.

  “How are Sofia and Sana?” I asked in return.

  Zayaan’s sisters were several years younger
than me, and I got along just fine with them. They were open-minded, honest women, more like Zayaan than their mother.

  “Are they around?” Say yes, so we can quit this absurd attempt at a conversation, I mentally urged her to act. Why didn’t she hang up?

  Why didn’t I?

  On the dawn-tinged deck, Nirvaan performed a series of twisty torso stretches. He had on a full-sleeved orange swim shirt and black wetsuit-style shorts and was obviously chomping at the bit to try out the Jet Skis.

  I flapped my hand to catch his attention. Save me, my hero.

  “No, beta. Sofia went out with friends straight from work, and Sana is getting ready. We’re having dinner at Waseem’s house.”

  Zayaan’s youngest sister, Sana, was engaged to Waseem Thakur, the prescreened, fully approved—by Gulzar Begum—Khoja from East London.

  “That’s nice,” I muttered.

  She began a familiar lament about her older two children who refused to bring her similar solace. She’d blamed me for Zayaan’s single status for a long time, even after I’d married Nirvaan. She’d blamed me for a whole lot worse twelve years ago. I’d believed her then. I’d been too young, too frightened, and too confused not to succumb to the authority of an adult, and she’d taken advantage of it.

  I wasn’t that naive anymore. If I chose to blame myself now, it was in full cognizance of my own actions.

  Nirvaan came into the kitchen, grinning like a shark, as if he enjoyed seeing me tortured.

  Dog.

  On cue, Zayaan’s mother brought up Marjaneh, the perfect bride for her perfect son, and I pounced. A dog was so much shark fodder.

  “Oh. Here’s Nirvaan, Auntie. He’s dying to talk to you.” Grinning, I shoved the phone into his hands but not before I heard the gasp.

  Narrow-minded, judgmental creature that she was, I’d shocked her by my word choice. Too bad, but I’d quit dancing around the word death and its variations a long time ago. When cancer lived in your home, inside your husband’s body, there was no avoiding the word or state.

  “What the hell, Simi?” Nirvaan whispered as he pinched my butt. He was a trooper though. He pressed the receiver to his ear, and with innate flair, he began to charm the devil out of Zayaan’s mother.

  My husband could sell fur to a bear for a profit without much effort. I left him to it and resumed the breakfast preparations.

  “You’re coming for the party, Auntie. No excuses,” he said after a whole lot of rubbish conversation.

  Hearing him, I wilted like a week-old rose. Much as I’d hate Gulzar Begum raining on my parade, I’d have to suck it up. After all was said and done and forgiven or not, she was Zayaan’s only living parent. Sure, guilt was the forerunner in that relationship, and she took immense advantage of her son’s feelings. Zayaan’s father and brother were dead. Zayaan was the only male left in his family. His mother knew just where to drive in the screws. But I also knew Zayaan loved his mother and thought the world of her. He’d want her at his thirtieth birthday bash—and Marjaneh, too.

  I wilted some more.

  Zayaan came into the house, a prayer book pressed between his arm and torso. He went into his room, and within seconds, he came out empty-handed. He gave me the evil eye, letting me know that, deep in conversation with Allah or not, he’d heard every word I’d said to his mother, and he was aware of every negative vibe flowing between here and London.

  I wasn’t sorry for any of it or for the way things were between us—they couldn’t be any other way—yet an apology jumped to my lips. I bit it off and poured yellowy batter onto the heated waffle plate instead.

  Fifteen minutes later, the mama’s boy hung up the phone and joined us on the deck to consume three ice-cold waffles. He ate them without complaint.

  Nirvaan wouldn’t have been so obliging. He would’ve fed the floppy waffles to the seagulls and demanded a reorder from the house chef. And because Zayaan hadn’t complained and he always defended me to his mother, I brewed him a consolation cup of double espresso. As apologies went, it was unremarkable, but it made him smile.

  A long time ago, my whole existence had revolved around Zayaan’s smile.

  I took a deep breath, and on a ten-count exhalation, I let the past fade from my mind. I bent and kissed my husband. He was my life now.

  Next order of the day, the guys dared me to a Jet Ski race, and lots more pixels were added to the Jaws album.

  Kamlesh Desai was a one-man riot with a deep-chested guffaw he was unafraid to overuse.

  It was easy to see where Nirvaan had gotten his energy and charm even though the father-son duo looked nothing alike. My father-in-law was a small, spare man with a big mustache and a full head of hair. Even as he pushed toward sixty, it was a natural jet-black. He swore that the daily application of a hibiscus-infused coconut oil was the secret to his hair’s health. He kept it parted to the left and combed it several times a day in an offhand unconscious manner with a small maroon comb he carried in his wallet at all times.

  I loved my father-in-law’s little quirks. I could watch him for hours and never get bored. For such a petite man, he had a king-size personality and an even bigger heart.

  Compared to her husband, my mother-in-law was a mouse. She was quiet and serious but in no way timid. My in-laws were equal partners in life and in business. You picked up on it immediately from the moment you met them. They reminded me so much of my own parents that I sometimes found it impossible to be around them without getting emotional. But the same also made it easy for me to love them.

  I used to tease Nirvaan that the only reason I’d married him was because I was madly in love with his father. And since I couldn’t have my main man, I’d settled for his gene type.

  “Your uncle just can’t sit still,” my mother-in-law muttered, shaking her head at her husband who was expelling his inexhaustible energy rather loudly into a karaoke mic.

  Smiling at my gyrating father-in-law, I winced when the surround sound suddenly blared off-key and filled the house with shrill maniacal bleats. Besides enthusiasm, he had zero singing potential.

  It also amused me that my mother-in-law never addressed her husband by name, not directly, not even when she spoke of him in context. It was always “your uncle” or “your daddy” or “Mr. Desai” or “my husband” or “that man,” if she was angry with him, but never simply “Kamlesh.” It was an old Indian custom—I supposed, a sexist one in guise of respect—which forbade a wife to call her husband by his given name. I had no idea why my mother-in-law still practiced it.

  She was a modern woman. She wore Western clothes, even shorts on occasion, though never for family or religious functions or in India. She was a workingwoman, had been for more than half of her life. My in-laws had come to America, leaving their six-year-old daughter and two-year-old son with their parents, to build a better life for their family than they’d had in India. They’d come in search of the American Dream and found it.

  Kamlesh Desai had worked at gas stations and grocery stores while Kiran Desai had cleaned houses and cooked for people until, between them, they’d saved enough money to invest in a California highway motel. Still, they’d worked three jobs each, pouring their savings into their first motel and then another and another. Eventually, they’d quit the other jobs and focused their energies on expanding their motel business. Once their green cards had come through, they’d brought their teenage children to LA and settled down there.

  My in-laws were self-made, hard-working people, even now.

  So, it baffled me that my mother-in-law still held on to an antiquated custom in a country she, too, refused to call home. My own parents had addressed each other by name and a whole slew of endearments, including bawaji and bawiji, which most simplistically translated to Parsi man and Parsi woman.

  My in-laws were different from my parents in so many ways, but in the ways it counted most, they were exactly the same. Family meant everything to them.

  “Simi,” Nirvaan bellowed from six paces
away, “you’re up.”

  “Khodai save me,” I groaned under my breath. But I set the knife down on the cutting board and washed my hands in the kitchen sink before dragging my feet into the living room.

  I was not a nightingale. I was more like a crow when it came to singing, but the whole family had to participate in the stupid karaoke competition, and no one was exempt. If the lot of them wanted to listen to me caw, who was I to deny them the pleasure?

  I plucked the mic from Nirvaan’s hands, stuck my chin in the air, and belted out a not-too-passé Bollywood hit song, “You Are My Sonia.” Luckily, one could not hear one’s self sing.

  Torture complete, I mock-bowed and marched back into the kitchen with consolation applause ringing behind me.

  Dinner wasn’t for another hour even though my mother-in-law and I had been toiling by the stove for some time. The guys had come in from their evening rides exhilarated and not the least bit tired. After showering and settling in front of the TV to watch the news, snacking on some fried munchies and non-alcoholic beers before dinner, my father-in-law had had the brilliant karaoke idea. His vivacity truly knew no bounds.

  If you knew Indians at all, then you’d know of their obsession with their music, especially filmy item numbers. If India as a nation had a passion, it was singing. Dancing, too, but I believed singing more. Indians could break into a song at the drop of a hat. You didn’t even have to ask twice. We were a loud, hectic people, and our music reflected our passions.

  When it was my mother-in-law’s turn to be center stage, I took over watching the stove sizzling with pots of mixed vegetables, kadhi—the sweetened curry version native to Surat—and boiling rice. We were having a full Gujarati bhonu this evening, and the kitchen was puffing out spicy steam like smoke signals for the hungry.