Destination Wedding

by Diksha Basu

  “I’m glad we got to see each other this week,” Tina said. And even though she was sad, she meant it.

  “Me too. You should move to Bombay. I’m not joking—from everything I’ve heard you say this week, you belong in India. Not just this week—from everything you said that night in London. And in Bombay you could keep doing the work you’re doing.”

  “I need to go,” Tina said. She gestured vaguely onto the lawn.

  “Your mother’s cool, by the way,” Rocco said.

  “I’ll see you,” Tina said and climbed over the low wooden fence, past the poinsettias, and toward her mother sitting on a yoga mat in the darkness.

  Radha was wearing a long, cream-colored dress with a shawl draped over her shoulders. Her feet were bare, a pair of bejeweled jootis lying side by side near the yoga mat. On a tray there was a copper tumbler and glass of water. Radha shifted over on her mat and said to her daughter, “Come, sit near me. The grass is getting wet with dew.”

  Tina sat down, her feet in the grass, her knees pulled up to her chin. She could hear cars honking and trucks rumbling past in the distance, dogs barking, and two women talking at the far end of the lawn.

  “That fellow is very charming,” Radha said. “Rocco, right? I saw him very patiently playing table tennis with an old man yesterday. And then his equally old wife kissed Rocco square on the lips and Rocco took it well.”

  Tina watched Rocco walk away and smiled into the darkness.

  “Where’s David?” she asked her mother.

  “In the main kitchen,” Radha said. “With the chef. He wants to learn how to make the paneer tikkas from lunch the other day and in return is teaching the chef how to make his mother’s meat loaf. Imagine Indians eating meat loaf.”

  “I don’t think I’ve ever eaten meat loaf,” Tina said. “Did you ever make meat loaf for us?”

  “I doubt it,” Radha said.

  Most nights they’d had takeout or microwavable meals or, at most, a basic khichdi, but it was generous of her daughter to ask this.

  “Is he enjoying being here?”

  “Loving it,” Radha said. “I’m enjoying seeing it through his eyes. It’s nice to sometimes see something familiar from a fresh perspective.”

  The two women who had been talking on the edge of the lawn were walking past them, unable to see Tina and Radha sitting in the dark. It was Bubbles Trivedi with a friend. Both women had big, brown hair and were smoking cigarettes as they walked.

  “You’ve outdone yourself with this one,” the friend was saying to Bubbles.

  “It’s a much higher budget than I needed,” Bubbles said. “But don’t tell anyone that, obviously. I’ve given them the impression that this is peanuts—as if it’s basically volunteer work for me. I didn’t know what I was getting into until the grandmother said they wanted to give everyone those fancy Bose noise-canceling headphones as favors.”

  “The grandmother with dementia?” the friend asked.

  “That’s the one. Her son told me to humor her and let her pick out the flowers and the favors so she’ll feel important.”

  “So everyone’s getting those headphones?” the friend asked.

  “They’re getting iPads! Just to test the waters I told her nobody gives anything less than iPads to the guests these days and next thing I know that grandmother ordered seven hundred and fifty new iPads. One for me also.”

  Both the women laughed and continued down the path.

  “I guess we’re getting new iPads,” Radha said.

  “Bubbles Trivedi,” Tina said. “Now, that’s a reality show character. My Big Fat Indian Wedding.”

  “That’s a terrific idea,” Radha said.

  “Give her a good catchphrase. Put her in different animal-print outfits for every episode. Let her go scouting for white people in the youth hostels around town,” Tina said. “Have her bribing the local police commissioner to keep music going past the allotted time. Send her to Bombay in search of Bollywood stars to attend the wedding, for a price.”

  “This is not the Delhi I once knew,” Radha said.

  She reached beside her and opened her water bottle.

  “I don’t know the real Delhi. I keep thinking I do. I keep thinking I’m finding it under bridges or at street corners but I’m not. And I can’t find one of my diamond earrings,” Tina said.

  “Did you check all your shirts? I must have lost a dozen earrings while pulling shirts off. Delhi is like New York in that sense. Those real housewives of New York tell you more about New York, poverty and all, than a tour of the outer boroughs.”

  “I can’t believe how much you watch those shows,” Tina said. “Your clients would lose faith in you if they knew.”

  “Imagine something like that set here. It would be madness,” Radha said.

  She reached over to the tumbler next to her and poured out a glass of water.

  “Do you want some?” she asked Tina. “Water kept in copper tumblers is supposed to be good for the health. I bought two of these at Cottage Industries today. Would you like one for your apartment?”

  Tina looked at the mottled copper glass. It wouldn’t go in her Williamsburg apartment that had no traces of anything Indian.

  “I like it,” Tina said. “I’ll take one if it’s extra.”

  “How’s Marianne?” Radha asked.

  “Marianne is Marianne. Good old Marianne the chameleon,” Tina said. “She thinks she should marry some rich Indian guy and live in Hong Kong or Dubai. I don’t know how she doesn’t see how lucky she is to have Tom.”

  “Forget Tom. You girls are lucky to have each other. Female friendships are difficult. Female relationships in general are difficult.”

  “Do you think you could ever live in India again?” Tina asked.

  Radha exhaled and looked into the distance. She’d had this question on her mind since she arrived. She loved India—the sights, the smell, the feeling of home, the food, the people, even the crowds. The reason she had moved to Manhattan right after her divorce was that Manhattan reminded her of India—the chaos comforted her. She had never liked the suburbs.

  “What would I do here?” she asked. “I love this country but home is where you make your home, not necessarily where you were born.”

  Tina looked over at her mother again, the moonlight catching the small diamond nose ring in her nose.

  “I think this Bubbles idea is terrific,” Radha said. “I bet she would also round up a nutty cast of characters.”

  “Do you think I could make India home?” Tina asked.

  “I’m surprised to hear you ask that. Your whole life you’ve wanted nothing more than to be American,” Radha said.

  “Because you encouraged it,” Tina said.

  “Of course I did, darling,” Radha said. “Because nobody wants to see their daughter feel like an outsider. We lived in a different time. And you are an American. As much or as little as Marianne is, or I am, or even your father is.”

  “That’s all fine to say but if I’m in line at a gas station anywhere outside New York, I’m still an outsider. Especially the way America is now,” Tina said. “Here at least I look like the billion other people around me. But then there’s the traffic. How on earth am I supposed to fit in if I scream in terror every time I need to cross the road?”

  “Tina, you’ll never get anywhere if you keep thinking of yourself as an outsider. You’ve never let yourself fit in or belong and I don’t know why. You don’t have to be American or Indian or even Indian-American. You just have to be you. Did I really forget to teach you that all these years?”

  “Your being you seems to not include Papa and me,” Tina said, feeling all the anger that had ebbed and flowed over the years. “You seem so much happier now.”

  Tina looked away and Radha put her hand around Tina’s upper arm and leane
d into her daughter.

  “Tina, you don’t need anyone’s permission to be happy,” she said. “I am happier now but I’m still your mother and I’m still your father’s partner in many ways, just not romantic ones. But please understand that you don’t know, or need to know, the details of our separation. You just need to understand that it wasn’t about you.”

  “Maybe I do need to know the details,” Tina said.

  “No,” Radha said. “You don’t need the burden of deciding who was right or wrong between your parents. That isn’t your role. That was and is for us to figure out, and we did, and if we can get along now and move on, so can you.”

  “I’ve always blamed you,” Tina said. “I just assumed I should always blame you because you so quickly seemed so happy and David is…David is everything Papa isn’t.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Radha said. “David may be white and Papa brown but they’re more similar than you realize.”

  Radha shook her head with a smile.

  “I’ll always have a soft spot for Papa,” she said.

  “Was it his fault? The divorce?” Tina pushed again.

  “I want to say yes so you’ll forgive me, Tina, but it was nobody’s fault. It just didn’t work and we were fortunate enough to live in a time and place where divorce was acceptable. That’s all there is to it.”

  Tina looked over at her mother as she heard a low hiss beside her. She was looking for the source when the sprinklers suddenly turned on full blast, cold water coming at them from all directions. They jumped up, her mother grabbed her shoes and yoga mat, Tina grabbed the copper tumbler, and they ran toward the dry pavement.

  Bubbles Trivedi and her friend were walking back toward the lawn, both still smoking cigarettes, now with wineglasses in hand as well. Tina and Radha came to a stop in front of them, water dripping from their clothes and hair.

  “Dear, dear, dear,” Bubbles said. “Look at you two. What a mess. Here, take my wine.”

  She handed the wineglass over to Radha who took it despite the pink lipstick mark on the edge and drank it down.

  Bubbles looked at Tina and said, “I hear you were ill today. Nice to see you up and about. Silver lining—I think you lost some weight.” She poked Tina’s stomach and continued, “I always say a little bit of food poisoning is the best pre-wedding ritual. I encourage all my brides to step out for a little street food the day before the reception. You have to time it well, though. You can’t be rushing off to the toilet when you need to be shaking hands with the finance minister, am I right?”

  Then Bubbles placed her hand on Radha’s wrist and said, “Now, you’re the one with that handsome American boyfriend. Come, walk with me. We’ll get you dried off and you tell me your wedding plans. I’ll organize every last detail for you. I work with only the best clients. An interracial second marriage? The possibilities are endless.”

  “You could have the wedding somewhere in the UK—hints of Camilla and Charles,” Tina said with a laugh. “And what if my father walked my mother down the aisle?”

  “Stop that,” Radha said. “You’re both mad.”

  “Come, come,” Bubbles said to Radha. “I agree the Camilla–Charles idea is a bit bleak. I was thinking more along the lines of raw silk saris in shades of gold for you and your dearest friends. A matching bandhgala for that handsome husband. Something modern, something multicultural. Catered by Dishoom, of course. Have you been?”

  “David has.”

  Bubbles dropped her cigarette on the ground and crushed it underfoot as she continued.

  “They’ve changed the face of Indian dining in the UK. It’s no longer bright orange curry masquerading as chicken tikka masala. I went to the one in Carnaby last time I was there and a small dog urinated right near my chair, can you imagine? That’s exactly why I hate outdoor eating.”

  “Terrible,” Bubbles’s friend said. “The only thing worse is live music in restaurants.”

  “Don’t even get me started,” Bubbles said. “If I want to go to a concert, I’ll go to a concert. I don’t need the concert brought to my dinner table, forcing me to smile politely at the loud saxophone player blowing my wig off.”

  “That’s a wig?” Radha asked.

  Bubbles touched her beehive hair and said, “A lady never reveals her secrets.”

  “But you just did,” her friend said.

  “I’m going to go change and check on Marianne,” Tina said, going in the opposite direction toward her cottage.

  “Be gentle with her,” Radha said, touching Tina’s shoulder.

  * * *

  —

  TINA ENTERED THE ROOM and saw Marianne asleep in her bed, even though it was barely dark outside. She was on top of the sheets in her pajamas, a glass of water and her Kindle on her bedside table. Tina remembered Marianne falling asleep early and on top of her covers at Yale whenever she had done badly on an exam. Marianne always took her classes more seriously than Tina did and a low grade broke her heart and left her without enough energy to even get under her sheets. Whenever Tina found her like that, she would cover her with a red HSBC blanket they had got for free during orientation week freshman year.

  The black dress Marianne had worn last night was lying in a heap in the corner of the room. Her small Livia daily journal was also on her bedside table with a pen inside. Marianne was usually faithful about penning down a few sentences about her day before bed every night but Tina hadn’t noticed her doing that on this trip until now. A bottle of Neosporin powder stood beside the journal. Marianne’s suede Tod’s loafers were neatly lined under her bed, the cream-colored heels jutting out.

  THURSDAY NIGHT

  Mrs. Sethi’s House, New Delhi: Lavina Is Making Carrot Cake That Mrs. Sethi Will Eat a Slice of and Then Declare Too Rich and Then Lavina Can Eat the Rest

  AROUND THE SAME TIME, IN another part of the city, Mrs. Sethi poured herself a glass of white wine topped with soda. She needed something to take the edge off but she didn’t want to be drunk. This all felt so crazy—this dating, this man, these butterflies. Until now she had only been on dates with men she’d met once, at most twice, and never spoken to again. There was never a question of anything physical or intimate but all of a sudden that was all there, hanging in the air, with this man who lived across the world.

  She sat down on the new vintage armchair on her balcony—it had arrived this morning and she already loved it. She had spotted it in Chor Bazaar in Bombay when she was there visiting her cousin a few months back. Her cousin, who had made plenty of money as an advertising executive and now ran a design store in Kamala Mills that made no money, had offered to have the armchair reupholstered in a mustard-yellow vegan leather and shipped to her in Delhi. Mrs. Sethi shouted for Lavina to bring her a bowl of salted peanuts, pulled her feet up under her, and reached for her phone.

  “Hi, Ma,” Minal answered. “You’re calling from home.”

  “Hi, beta,” Mrs. Sethi said. “Yes, I’m at home. Just enjoying the Delhi weather. Having wine and peanuts on the balcony.”

  “I want to see. Should I call back on video?” Minal asked.

  “No, no,” Mrs. Sethi said. She didn’t want to be looking at her daughter’s face for this conversation. “Let’s just chat. I paid for unlimited free calls to the United States and Canada and I don’t even know anyone in Canada.”

  Mrs. Sethi took a sip of her wine for strength and then quickly, before she could overthink it, said, “Minal, I think I’ve met someone.”

  And then she told her everything. She had been dreading this call. Minal was so attached to her father and so heartbroken when he died. It was because of Minal that Mrs. Sethi still kept all her late husband’s clothes exactly as he had left them in his cupboard. She had given away some of his ties but everything else was still on the same hangers and the same shelves. When Minal came to Delhi she often wore her father�
�s shirts and sweaters and left traces of her perfume on them.

  Maybe Mrs. Sethi also kept the cupboard that way a little bit for herself. She missed her husband. Not with the same ache that she had for the year after he had died but she still missed him every day—until this week when she suddenly realized she hadn’t thought of him for a day. She would never forget him; she could never forget him—but maybe she could honor his memory and finally, nearly ten years later, also move on.

  “He has a daughter?” Minal asked when Mrs. Sethi had finished.

  “Yes, your age. And she’s lovely. I think you’ll get along,” Mrs. Sethi said.

  “You’ve spent a lot of time with her, then?”

  “Some, not a lot. She lives in New York. They’re all here for a wedding. Even the ex-wife with her new boyfriend.”

  “Ma,” Minal said. “This is going to sound petty, but—”

  “No, no, dear. You say whatever you need to. I wanted to tell you before taking things any further. I don’t even know what further means anymore at this age. But this is just something I’m exploring. If you’re not ready, I’ll call it off.”

  “Ma, stop, stop. I’m so happy to hear this. I’ve been wanting you to do this. Remember when you came here and I introduced you to my friend’s father—Mr. Dogra? That was meant to be a setup.”

  “That man? Minal, he was nearly eighty and overweight,” Mrs. Sethi said. “Have some standards for me.”

  Minal laughed and said, “I know! My friend kept saying how handsome her father was. I had never seen a picture.”

  “And remember he kept talking about what good Indian food he had eaten on holiday in Japan?” Mrs. Sethi said.