Rita gave me a stern look. “Sit down, Meena. I want to hear your story.”
“There is no story. I told you everything.”
Rita glanced at her husband. “Sweetie, would you mind if I talked to Meena for a bit?”
“I’ll go watch TV upstairs.” Anoop shot to his feet and headed for the staircase. “ ’Bye, Meena. Nice seeing you again.”
“ ’Bye, Anoop. I’m sorry, but I promise not to keep your wife away from you for too long.”
“Hey, what are friends for?”
We watched him climb the stairs. Then Rita turned to me. “Okay, I want to know everything. Something weird is going on with you.”
“You have to promise not to tell anyone, okay?”
“Do you even need to ask?”
“No, but this is like ... so embarrassing.”
Rita patted the seat next to her on the couch, inviting me to sit beside her. “I even told you about the first time Anoop and I had sex and how badly it went.” She tossed me a self-deprecating smile. “Now that’s embarrassing.”
Laughing, I went to sit beside her. “But it got better and better, right?” She nodded, and I went back to my story. “It all started the day I collided into Prajay Nayak and fell down. At first I thought he looked scary, with his big nose and six-and-a-half-foot body. But then he carried me in his arms to his office and hovered over me, brought me hazelnut-flavored coffee and ... made me feel pampered.”
“Hmm.” Rita looked impressed.
“By the end of the hour I’d changed my mind about his looks. When he smiled, he looked rather attractive.”
“Then what?”
“He let me fall asleep on the couch in his office after I took some strong painkillers. He carried me again all the way down to the parking lot and to my boss’s car. Then he sent me roses the next day.”
“Nice guy.”
“And oh, he even borrowed someone’s beat-up Toyota and drove me back and forth to work for several days. He gave up his Corvette to make me comfortable. Isn’t that sweet?”
“Extraordinarily sweet. A guy doesn’t give up his Corvette for anything—if he can help it.”
“That’s what I said. But because of it I was foolish enough to think he was interested in me.”
Rita motioned to me to continue.
“Turns out I was wrong.” The familiar lump was forming in my throat. “He asked me to come secretly to his office one evening after work, so I thought he wanted to ask me for a date. Stupid me—I went prancing into his office with bells on my toes.”
Wide-eyed, Rita stared at me. “What did he say?”
“Wait till you hear this. You’d never guess in a million years. I’m still in shock. Not only did he not ask me out, he had a special project for me. He’s been unsuccessful in finding the right woman despite dating a parade of women. He wanted me to help him place personal ads in newspapers and with Internet matchmaking services for the perfect woman.”
“What?”
“He wants someone who’s six feet tall.”
Rita’s mouth fell open. “Holy cow! He asked you to help him find her?”
“He wants her to be well-educated, too, and in a nice career, if possible. Looks don’t matter, he says. If she just happens to be attractive, well, then it’s a plus—according to him.”
Rita wrinkled her nose. “He wants an Amazon in his bed. Yikes!”
“Not only that, he paid me to do it. He said he pays a standard fee to his consultants and since this was sort of ... a personal consultation, he was going to pay me the same.”
“The man’s insane. He couldn’t find his own woman? He had to hire a pretty young employee to do his dirty work? Especially one who happened to be interested in him?”
I realized Rita hadn’t quite grasped my dilemma. “But he didn’t know how I felt about him. Besides, he’s somewhat like my dad—very analytical and nerdy. In a classy sort of way, though,” I added. “He seemed to think it was perfectly normal to go about looking for a future wife in the same manner one would seek a car or a house, or a mutual fund.”
“And you did as he requested?”
“What choice did I have? When my boss asks me to do a special project for him and pays me to do it, what do I say to him? Shove it? Get lost? Or was I supposed to tell him that I was interested in him and therefore he shouldn’t look any further?”
Rita started chewing on her nails like she usually did when she was thinking hard. “I guess not. But then I’ve never heard of anything so wacky.”
“Neither had I.”
“So you agreed and completed his project?”
I heaved a long sigh. “Yes. But there’s more. When dozens and dozens of responses started coming in, he was overwhelmed, and he extended my responsibilities a bit. He said he had no time to look at them, so he wanted me to study them, sort them, and pick the top four or five candidates so he could contact them.”
Rita groaned. “This is getting more and more bizarre. Why didn’t he get his secretary to do it?”
“He didn’t want anyone to know. Because my expertise is in marketing and PR, and because I’m a fellow Konkani, he thought I was the perfect individual to handle his secret project. I was sworn to secrecy. You’re the only person I’ve confided in.”
“Hmm.” Rita was chewing her coral-painted nails vigorously, ruining her manicure. “I won’t tell anyone.”
“Wait till you hear the rest of the story. I sorted through the responses. And you should have seen some of them—outrageous. Female wrestlers, women with thyroid problems, ex-convicts, half the female population of India ... you name it, they were there on that list. So I had quite a job sorting the better ones from the crazies.” I swallowed to keep the threatening tears at bay. “I made a neat little database with seven good candidates and handed it over to him.”
“He never noticed you even once?”
The tears were close to spilling over now, but I was holding on. “Last Saturday he asked me to go to Great Adventure with him and his little nephew and niece. The kids were cute, and I had the best day of my life. Prajay was fun, and we laughed a lot and ... oh God ...”
I sniffled, and Rita silently handed me a box of tissues.
Grabbing a tissue, I dried my eyes. “For a day I pretended we were a family—he and I and our two kids ... you know ... like a pretty picture book.”
“How sweet!” Rita looked like she was about to cry, too. She covered us both with the fleece blanket sitting on the back of the couch—just like we used to do when we watched videos together on weekends when we were teenagers.
“Oh, Rita, I did the most stupid thing in the world.”
“What?” She knew by now of course.
“By Saturday night I had fallen in love with Prajay Nayak. I was a goner. Five-foot me was madly in love with the NBA-PLAYER-TYPE Prajay. Talk about a failure waiting to happen.”
“You poor thing. No wonder you look so miserable.” This time Rita did start to shed tears.
We’d read many of the same romance novels and had the same kind of foolish belief in true love. Fortunately for her, Anoop had come into her life and swept her off her feet. I, on the other hand, had not found anyone. Until now.
And he was the wrong man.
“You don’t know the half of it. On Sunday he took me out to dinner at a Thai restaurant.” When Rita nodded, I said, “On the way back, he invited me to go up to his townhouse.”
“What preposterous project did he have for you this time?”
“He wanted me to help him analyze the spreadsheet.”
“Oh puleeez!” Rita blew her nose. “The bastard made you take his karma in your hands and mold it into shape for him.”
“Exactly.” I realized Rita had described the situation perfectly.
“And you willingly did it, you foolish girl?”
“Not willingly.” My voice was raspy from trying to suppress the tears. “Later on he offered me ice cream and then ... and then he kissed m
e.”
I heard Rita’s sharp intake of breath. “Omigod. How was it?”
This time I burst into noisy tears. “I—I loved it. Prajay’s a great kisser. And I wanted more.”
“Then you should have asked for more, honey.” Rita pressed yet another tissue into my hand.
“That’s the problem. He backed off and apologized. He said it amounted to sexual harassment on his part because I was an innocent and sweet young employee who he should have treated with respect and that it was wrong of him to take advantage of me.”
Rita blew her nose hard. It sounded like a duck quacking. “He thinks you’re a sweet virgin?”
“I told him I wasn’t an innocent babe and that I had dated before, but he wouldn’t listen. He gave me every reason to put an end to our relationship—or whatever it is we have. He says he’s too rough, too tall, too big, too old ... and too damn everything for a woman like me.”
“Oh boy.” Rita shook her head sadly.
“So according to him we’re entirely wrong for each other. He says I’m a lovely and smart young lady and I’ll make some man a wonderful wife and some kids a great mother in the future.”
Rita gave me her best-friend look. “He’s right, you know. When the right guy comes along, you’ll make the best wife and mother.”
I was racked by sobs and couldn’t stop myself. “But Prajay is the right guy, Rita. I’m in love with him. I want him and no other guy. I’ve had relationships before. I’ve known a lot of men, but I’ve never, ever felt like this about anyone.”
Rita put her arms around me and rocked me like a baby. “Oh, Meena, Meena, what a horrible thing to happen to you. That big, clueless giant doesn’t deserve you, honey. You can do a lot better, believe me.”
“But I don’t want to do better.” I gave Rita a teary-eyed look. “Would you want anyone else but Anoop?”
She shook her head.
“Well, there you go. I’m in love with Prajay Nayak. And if I can’t have him, then I guess I’ll stay single.”
Rita let out a laugh that clearly said it was a stupid idea. “Don’t be silly. By this time next month you will have forgotten the man. He’s not worthy of you, and you’ll realize that after a while.”
I shook my head vigorously. “Not likely—not the way I feel. I’m hurting like mad. I feel like my life is over.”
Rita smacked my hand. “Don’t say that. I don’t want to hear such crazy talk. If you have your heart set on the giant with the big nose, we’ll figure something out.”
It was my turn to laugh. “Figure what out? He’s returning to Washington tomorrow. And he doesn’t want me. He wants a six-foot woman who can look him in the eye—who understands his ... bigness. He thinks any physical contact between him and me will shatter me to pieces. He believes I’m fragile because I’m small.”
“He’s an idiot,” Rita said.
I dried my tears again and discarded the tissues in the trash can. “I always hated being tiny. Now I hate it even more.”
“You may be tiny, but you’re beautiful,” declared Rita. “You have more heart and spirit and spunk than any six-foot dinosaur out there. And if that Nayak guy had any brains in that big head of his, he’d have realized what a prize you are. Instead he’s blindly groping around for some woman who shops at the Big and Tall Men’s Store. What a dunce.”
“Yeah, dunce.” I blew my nose and watched the balls of tissue in the trash can piling up. Rita and I had gone through half a box of tissues.
We sat huddled under the blanket for a long time, sniffling and denigrating men for having no brains whatsoever. That’s how Anoop found us nearly an hour later. He took one look at us and stopped dead. “Are you two all right?”
I immediately jumped up from the sofa. “Sorry, Anoop. I didn’t mean to burden your wife with my problems.”
“I ... It’s okay, Meena.” He looked at his wife with deep concern. I could see he didn’t really mean what he’d said to me. His eyes said he hated me for making his sweetheart cry.
“No, Anoop, I’m really sorry. I came here to chat a little and ended up making Rita my official therapist. I’ll leave you two alone now.”
Rita stood up and put her arms around me. “Don’t worry too much, okay? Everything will be all right. You wait and see.”
I gave her a faux smile. “I’m feeling better already. You make a great counselor, Rita Tandon.” It felt odd to say her married name. I wasn’t quite used to it yet.
“Don’t be silly. I did nothing,” Rita assured me.
“You did more than you realize.” I patted her hand and took off.
I left them standing in the doorway of their townhouse, their arms entwined. It was a nice, warm image to carry in my mind. Maybe Rita was right. A month from now, I’d laugh about this whole business with Prajay.
But deep down I knew it wasn’t going to happen. Next month, next year, next century—it wasn’t likely to happen.
Chapter 18
Just when I thought the cloud following me would never give way to light, a little ray of sunshine appeared on our doorstep—in the person of my great-aunt, Chandra Kamat, otherwise known as Akka.
On a cool, sunny Saturday afternoon, Mom’s youngest sister, Madhuri Bhat, arrived from Connecticut, with Akka in tow.
This old lady was my mom’s paternal aunt, my grandfather’s youngest sister. Everyone called her Akka. Big sister. She was a feisty, seventy-eight-year-old widow, and she wasn’t very popular with my mother and her sisters.
They referred to Akka variously as the misfit, the renegade, the black sheep—all because she had disdained arranged marriage and married a man of her choice. Although he’d belonged to the right caste and community, the very fact that she had chosen love marriage, as those kinds of marriages are called in Indian culture, was enough to make her notorious in her day.
Evidently Akka’s behavior had been judged as scandalous sixty years ago: An eighteen-year-old had disobeyed her father and married a man who fell far below the family’s high expectations. Instead of marrying the rich businessman picked for her, she had insisted on marrying a poor college professor because she thought he was handsome and charming.
The marriage had been a happy one and had produced three healthy kids, and everything had been forgiven later—but never forgotten. My mom and her relatives still talked about Akka’s disregard for convention. Consequently Akka was deemed a corrupting influence on the young folks in the family.
“Keep the impressionable kids away from Akka,” was the general mantra amongst the family members.
Personally I was delighted to see the little old lady. She was my favorite great-aunt. She was utterly, deliciously different from my grandmother and the other elders I knew. Slim and petite, with an infectious smile, Akka still dyed her hair, wore modern glasses instead of granny spectacles, spoke good English, and giggled. She was even known to tell an off-color joke on occasion. And she loved thriller novels and Bollywood movies.
She was totally cool.
Mom cleared her throat when she saw me coming down the staircase in a rather short skirt to greet Akka, but I chose to ignore Mom. To make up for the skirt I bent down to touch Akka’s feet in the traditional manner of greeting an elder.
She caught my shoulders before I reached for her feet. “Ayyo, there is no need to do any of those old-fashioned things, Meena.” Instead she drew me into a hug.
“Hello, Akka. It’s great to see you again,” I said with a grin and returned the warm embrace. She smelled like she always did—of jasmine-scented talcum powder. Her hair was an unnatural black, pulled back in a bun, high on the head—quite chic. Her pale green and white-print crepe sari looked fresh with its matching green blouse and accessorized by a simple string of freshwater pearls and matching earrings.
Mom insisted on touching Akka’s feet despite her protests. Akka winked at me over Mom’s head. She clearly thought this was funny: the fifty-something woman acting more old-fashioned than her septuagenarian aunt.
Nonetheless she patted Mom’s head and murmured the expected: “Dev baren koro.” God bless you.
Dad knew Akka’s modern ways, so he offered her a handshake. “Welcome, Akka,” he said. “Hope you are enjoying your East Coast trip.”
“Ramdas, you are looking good,” she said with a diplomatic twinkle in her eye. “I see Kaveri is taking very good care of you.” Everyone knew the gray in Dad’s hair had multiplied, and he’d gained a few pounds around his middle—marks of a man on the wrong side of sixty.
The past week had been so dismal and I had cried so much that I badly needed some cheering up. I couldn’t think of anyone better than Akka to put some laughter back into my life. I’d spent time with her often enough to know she was a pistol.
I helped Dad carry Akka’s bulging suitcases into the house and up to the guest room. Akka always came with interesting presents for everyone in the family, hence the excessive amount of luggage.
“Where are my favorite grandnephews?” she asked, looking around for Maneel and Mahesh as she and Madhuri-pachi were ushered into the kitchen for refreshments.
“Maneel will come by later. Mahesh is working as usual,” I replied.
“This medical doctor business is too much stress and hard work. Paap,” she clucked. Poor soul. Konkanis tended to use the term liberally to express sympathy, although it was a homophone, its other meaning being sin. “Mahesh and Amrita are working all the time.”
“What’s so paap about Mahesh and Amrita?” snorted Madhuri-pachi. “They’re single, living at home, and don’t have to lift a finger. My sisters and I had husbands, housework, children, and a similar schedule to juggle when we were their age. We didn’t have any help or anybody to say paap.”
With a good-natured smile Akka patted Madhuri-pachi’s shoulder. “I used to say that about you and your sisters all the time when you first came to America and started your residencies. I used to worry about how you young girls managed such busy lives. Now it is Mahesh and Amrita’s turn.”
The Reluctant Matchmaker Page 17
