Chapter Eighteen: What If They Mean It?
Across Delhi, Maan was discovering that waiting was an activity capable of consuming an entire day.
Daadi had sent him out with one bag.
He had taken a suite at one of the Khurana Group's hotels because appearing at a friend's home unexpectedly would have required conversations he had neither the patience nor the dignity for.
The suite was enormous.
He hated it.
His phone lay on the table.
He had sent Geet one message.
Only one.
There had been eleven others before it.
Deleted.
One had been three paragraphs long.
Deleted.
One had tried to explain the weather.
Deleted with enough force that he'd nearly cracked the screen beneath his thumb.
One had simply said:
I love you.
That one had survived longest.
Then he'd deleted that too.
Eventually he sent:
I know you don't want to hear from me. I won't come near you unless you ask me to. I'm sorry.
Delivered.
Unread.
Maan checked again.
Still unread.
"Fck."
He threw the phone onto the sofa.
It landed safely.
Annoying.
Thirty seconds later, he picked it up again.
Nothing.
By early afternoon, restraint had become unbearable enough that he called Samar.
His cousin answered on the fourth ring.
"Yeah?"
"How is she?"
No greeting.
Samar was quiet for a moment.
"She came downstairs."
"Did she eat?"
"A little."
Maan looked toward the untouched coffee on the table.
"Is she leaving?"
"Nobody's asked."
"Right."
Silence settled between them.
Maan rubbed a hand over the back of his neck.
"Is she okay?"
Samar didn't pretend to misunderstand what he meant.
"No."
Maan closed his eyes.
"But she's with Rhea and Tara. Your mother too."
He exhaled slowly.
"Okay."
Another pause.
"Did she-"
He stopped.
Samar waited.
Maan looked at Geet's unread message on the screen.
"Nothing."
"Maan."
"What?"
"Daadi threw you out for one night."
His jaw tightened.
"I know."
"So come home tomorrow."
"I will."
"Good."
The call ended.
Maan lowered the phone.
Geet's message was still unread.
He did not send another.
Later that afternoon, Devika found Daadi sitting near the long windows overlooking the rear lawn.
For several minutes neither woman spoke.
Devika stood beside one of the chairs, hands folded loosely.
Finally she said, "He didn't tell me."
Daadi did not ask whom she meant.
"No."
"He got married."
"Yes."
"And didn't tell me."
There was no accusation in Devika's voice.
That made it heavier.
Daadi looked at her daughter-in-law.
Devika's eyes remained on the lawn.
"I didn't know there was someone."
"No."
"I didn't even know he was capable of disappearing for two weeks and coming back married."
Daadi's mouth shifted faintly.
"That part should not surprise you."
Under any other circumstances Devika might have smiled.
She didn't.
After a moment she said, "She took everything off this morning."
Daadi knew what she meant.
"The mangalsutra. The sindoor."
"Good."
Devika turned.
"Good?"
"If she wanted them off, yes."
Devika looked down.
"I know."
Daadi studied her.
"You are allowed to hurt for your son without asking that girl to carry the hurt for you."
Devika's throat moved.
"I wasn't going to."
"I know."
Another silence.
Then Devika said, "Rajendra is furious."
"He should be."
"Viren is worse."
"Viren enjoys being furious."
That earned the smallest breath of amusement.
It disappeared quickly.
Devika hesitated.
"Do you think-"
Daadi looked at her.
The question changed before Devika spoke it.
"Do you think we missed something with him?"
Daadi's gaze returned to the lawn.
"Maan has spent twenty-six years making it very difficult to know what he doesn't want known."
"That isn't an answer."
"No."
Devika waited.
Eventually Daadi said, "He did a terrible thing."
Devika lowered her eyes.
"Yes."
"Do not improve it for him."
"I won't."
"Do not worsen it either."
Devika looked back at her.
Daadi's voice remained calm.
"I heard Viren last night. 'This is Maan. This is what he does.'"
Her mouth hardened.
"I do not like sentences that begin that way."
Devika said nothing.
"He has always been difficult," Daadi continued. "Arrogant. Secretive. Too certain that if his intention is good, everybody else should eventually forgive the method."
A pause.
"That is not the same thing as being rotten."
Devika's eyes filled unexpectedly.
She looked away.
Daadi pretended not to notice.
"Judge what he did," she said. "That is enough."
Then she returned to the papers in front of her.
The conversation was over.
The cook eventually found Geet after lunch.
Apparently Devika had not forgotten.
"What do you like for dinner?"
"Anything."
He stared.
Geet sighed.
"Everyone hates that answer."
"Yes."
Tara, from a chair nearby, called, "Give him something or he'll follow you upstairs."
The cook did not deny it.
Geet thought.
Then, unexpectedly, something came.
"Kadhi."
The cook nodded.
"What kind?"
Geet described it.
A little thinner than usual.
More sour.
The way her mother had made it when Geet was small.
Halfway through explaining, she realized everyone nearby had gone quiet.
Not dramatically.
Just listening.
Geet stopped.
"Sorry."
The cook frowned.
"For what?"
She didn't know.
He asked another question about how sour she preferred it.
Geet answered.
He nodded.
"Tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?"
"Tonight is already planned."
And walked away.
Geet stared after him.
Tara looked delighted.
"Congratulations."
"For what?"
"You're on the menu now."
Geet looked at her.
Tomorrow.
The word landed strangely.
Everyone kept using it as though her presence tomorrow had already been established.
Nobody appeared to notice.
Geet did.
By evening, privacy had revealed itself to be mostly theoretical in the Khurana house.
Not because anyone entered rooms without knocking.
Nobody had entered hers.
But every time Geet stepped outside, somebody existed.
A cousin.
An aunt.
A child.
An uncle returning from work.
Staff.
Rhea.
Tara.
Someone going somewhere.
Someone returning.
Nobody seemed to think Geet required a formal reason to be among them.
That was the strange part.
She came downstairs before dinner and found Tara, Rhea, Samar and two male cousins in the family sitting room arguing over something on television.
Rhea looked up.
Then frowned.
"What?"
Geet stopped.
"What?"
"You're still dressed like that."
Geet looked down at herself.
"What is wrong with this?"
One of the cousins glanced over.
"Nothing."
Tara pointed at him.
"You're not part of this conversation."
"Very happy about that."
He returned to the television.
Tara looked back at Geet.
"We discussed comfortable."
"I am comfortable."
"No. You're respectable."
Geet stared.
"Is that bad?"
"In this house after six?" Tara considered. "Suspicious."
Samar looked up.
"Do not let my wife and cousin bully you into pajamas."
Rhea turned.
"You wear shorts to dinner."
"It's my ancestral home."
Tara gestured triumphantly.
"Exactly."
Geet looked from one to the other.
Rhea laughed.
"I did exactly this when I first married in."
"You keep saying that."
"Because I did. For the first few weeks I thought I had to look like someone's new daughter-in-law every time I left my room."
Geet's amusement faded.
Rhea noticed immediately.
She adjusted without making the adjustment obvious.
"Eventually I realized nobody cared."
"Nobody?"
"Daadi cares if you come to dinner barefoot because she thinks you'll catch pneumonia through marble."
"That's not how pneumonia works."
One of the male cousins looked up.
"Please tell her."
Rhea pointed at him.
"See? Biotechnology already useful."
Geet shook her head.
"Tomorrow," Rhea said, "wear whatever you actually want."
Tomorrow again.
Geet looked at her.
Rhea didn't notice the significance.
"Fine."
The word escaped.
Geet froze.
Rhea's face changed.
Tara looked away.
Silence threatened.
Geet breathed.
Then deliberately corrected herself.
"Okay."
Rhea nodded.
Nothing more.
The moment passed.
Dinner was noisier than lunch.
More people had returned from work. Geet met another older cousin, two spouses, an uncle she'd forgotten from the previous evening, and several children who appeared to migrate between adults with no obvious ownership.
She spoke when someone addressed her.
Answered questions about college.
Smiled when necessary.
Listened much more than she talked.
Nobody asked about Maan.
That absence became almost conspicuous.
His chair was not identified. Nobody said whether he normally sat at this table or another one. Nobody asked if Geet had spoken to him.
For most of dinner, his name did not appear at all.
Then one of the cousins complained that nobody had told him a car had been moved from the garage.
Another cousin said, "At least somebody told you eventually."
"What does that mean?"
"You remember Maan buying the motorcycle?"
A groan travelled from somewhere further down the table.
Samar laughed into his glass.
"What motorcycle?" somebody younger asked.
"Exactly," the cousin said. "That was also the family's reaction."
Another voice joined in.
"He kept it for almost three months before Rajendra uncle found out."
"Two."
"Three."
"It was two."
"Why was he hiding a motorcycle?" Tara asked.
"He wasn't hiding it."
Five people spoke at once.
"He absolutely was."
"He parked it at Samar's."
"That was not hiding."
Samar finally looked up.
"It was hidden at my apartment."
Rhea stared at her husband.
"You helped?"
"I was twenty-three."
"That is not an explanation."
"It felt like one at twenty-three."
Several people laughed.
Geet kept her eyes on her plate.
But she was listening.
She could picture it far too easily.
Maan deciding that informing his family about a motorcycle was unnecessary until circumstances forced the issue.
Apparently the instinct had precedent.
Someone further down the table said, "At least the motorcycle was harmless. Remember the first time he came home drunk?"
Samar groaned.
"Oh, God."
"What happened?" one of the teenagers asked immediately.
"Nothing happened," Samar said.
"Nothing?"
"He was nineteen. He came home drunk."
"Very drunk," someone corrected.
"He walked into a table."
"He walked near a table."
"He broke the vase."
"The vase survived."
"It did not."
"That vase had already been cracked."
A woman Geet couldn't yet name laughed.
"The way everyone tells that story, you'd think he'd arrived carrying contraband across an international border."
"He vomited in the hydrangeas."
"That part is true."
A younger cousin looked delighted.
"Did Daadi kill him?"
"Nearly."
From the head of the table, without looking up from her food, Daadi said:
"I did not."
Everyone went quiet.
Daadi lifted her eyes.
"I considered it."
Laughter broke around the table.
Even Samar.
Geet's mouth almost moved.
She stopped it.
Not because the story wasn't funny.
Because it was Maan.
And laughing at something about Maan felt dangerous in a way she could not explain.
Conversation had already moved on.
Nobody noticed.
But the stories remained.
A motorcycle nobody had known about.
A nineteen-year-old Maan stumbling home drunk while an entire dynasty apparently treated the event like a constitutional crisis.
People arguing over the details because they had all been there.
People who had known him before she did.
People who had loved him before she existed.
For one brief, disorienting moment, Maan became something other than the man who had broken her heart.
Someone's irritating younger cousin.
Someone's impossible grandson.
A boy who had hidden a motorcycle at Samar's apartment.
A nineteen-year-old who had apparently lost a battle with a hydrangea.
A person with history she had never known.
Geet resented how badly she wanted to hear more.
She said nothing.
Later, as people began leaving the table, Samar caught up with Rhea near the doorway.
Geet was a few steps ahead with Tara.
She had no reason to listen.
Then she heard Maan's name.
"Maan called me this afternoon."
Geet's steps did not change.
Rhea lowered her voice. "He did?"
"Asked how she was."
A pause.
"What did you tell him?"
"That she came downstairs. Ate a little."
Geet kept walking.
"Anything else?"
"He asked if she was leaving."
Rhea was quiet for a moment.
"And?"
"I told him nobody had asked."
Another few steps.
Geet could no longer hear Tara talking beside her. She knew Tara was saying something. The words simply weren't reaching properly.
Behind them, Rhea asked, "Is he still at the hotel?"
"Tonight."
"Daadi only sent him out for one night."
"I know. I told him."
There was the faint sound of Rhea's bracelet against the doorframe.
"Is he coming back?"
Samar's answer came easily.
"Tomorrow."
Geet's fingers tightened around the edge of the book she was carrying.
Tomorrow.
Again.
Only this time the word did not feel quite the same.
She kept walking.
She did not turn around.
She was not sure whether Samar knew she had heard.
She was not sure whether she wanted him to know.
After dinner she found Daadi alone in the corridor outside the old sitting room.
"Did they show you the house?"
"Most of it."
"Most?"
"Tara says the east side is unnecessary."
"For once, Tara is correct."
Geet nodded.
Daadi started to walk past her.
"Daadi."
The word stopped both of them.
It was the first time Geet had used it.
Daadi looked back.
Geet suddenly wished she hadn't spoken.
But the question had been sitting inside her all day.
"I don't know how long I'm going to stay."
Daadi waited.
Geet continued.
"I don't want anyone to think I'm assuming I can just-"
"Live here?"
Geet swallowed.
"Yes."
Daadi stared at her.
Not angrily.
More as though trying to understand why they were having this conversation at all.
"This is not a hotel."
Something almost moved at the corner of Geet's mouth.
"You do not need to keep asking how many nights you're permitted to sleep in your own room."
Geet looked at her.
"I know what you said last night."
"Do you?"
"You said I was family."
"Yes."
"Because I married Maan."
"No."
The answer came so quickly that Geet stopped.
Daadi's gaze remained steady.
"You entered this house because you married Maan."
A pause.
"That is not the same thing."
Geet said nothing.
"He brought you through the door."
Daadi's voice remained matter-of-fact.
"He does not own the door."
Something tightened painfully in Geet's chest.
Daadi continued walking.
Geet followed her with her eyes.
"Daadi."
The old woman stopped again.
"What?"
"If I don't-"
Geet couldn't finish.
If I don't remain his wife.
If I leave him.
If he marries somebody else one day.
If another woman becomes the daughter-in-law who should actually occupy this place.
The words lodged somewhere behind her ribs.
Daadi apparently had little patience for unfinished sentences.
"Do you believe I replace grandchildren according to their marital status?"
Geet blinked.
"I'm not your granddaughter."
Daadi's eyebrows rose.
Geet realized what she had said.
Too late.
For the first time something almost amused appeared in the older woman's face.
"Apparently I need to make this simpler."
She stepped closer.
"You are my granddaughter."
Geet stared at her.
"Not because Maan is behaving well enough to earn you."
A beat.
"Certainly not because he is behaving badly enough to lose you."
Geet couldn't speak.
Daadi looked faintly irritated by the necessity of explaining any of this.
"You walked into my house as a daughter."
Her gaze sharpened.
"That is what you are."
Geet's eyes filled immediately.
She looked down.
Daadi ignored the tears.
Almost mercifully.
"Whatever happens between you and my grandson is your business."
Geet swallowed.
"I don't want to be anyone's responsibility."
"Good."
Geet looked up.
"Then don't be."
The answer startled her.
Daadi adjusted the edge of her shawl.
"You think family is charity?"
Geet said nothing.
"You think we are going to count how many meals you eat and decide when the account has become inconvenient?"
Heat rushed behind Geet's eyes.
"No."
"Good. Because I have better things to do."
Despite herself, Geet nearly laughed.
Daadi watched her.
"You don't believe me."
Geet's silence answered.
"All right."
Geet looked up.
"You don't have to."
A pause.
"Not tonight. Not tomorrow."
Tomorrow.
Again.
"Stay long enough to find out."
Geet swallowed.
"Thank you."
Daadi sighed.
"We are going to have to cure you of that."
This time the laugh escaped.
Tiny.
Broken.
But real.
Daadi looked satisfied.
"Better."
Then she started down the corridor.
Geet stood where she was.
"Daadi?"
The old woman glanced back.
Geet hesitated.
"Can I take a book from the library?"
Daadi stared at her.
Geet knew immediately that she had made a mistake.
"You were shown the library."
"I know."
"And yet you're asking me whether you can read a book from it."
Geet's mouth trembled.
"Right."
Daadi continued walking.
"Take ten."
Geet watched her disappear around the corner.
Then she went to the library.
Later, alone in her room, Geet found a book on the bedside table.
Not one she had chosen.
A note rested on top in Tara's handwriting.
You looked at this one twice. I stole it for you.
Below that, in different handwriting:
It isn't stealing if it belongs to the house. - Rhea
And beneath that, apparently added later:
Precisely. - T
Geet sat on the edge of the bed.
The mangalsutra remained on the dresser.
Her phone remained nearby.
Maan's message was still unread.
Nothing important had been solved.
She still did not know whether she would remain married.
She still did not know when she would tell Mehek.
She had no idea what she would say to Uncle when the ordinary version of her new married life could no longer be maintained.
She did not know whether loving Maan would disappear simply because she had ordered it to.
And now she knew things about him she had not known yesterday.
A motorcycle.
A hydrangea.
A cousin named Samar who had hidden things for him when they were young.
A family that could be angry with him and still laugh at the boy he had been.
Geet hated that those fragments had found somewhere to stay inside her.
She picked up the book.
Last night, the only question inside her had been:
Where do I go?
Tonight another had appeared beside it.
She looked at the note.
At the room nobody had asked her to vacate.
At the kitchen where somebody was apparently going to make her mother's kadhi tomorrow because she had once mentioned liking it.
At the enormous house she still could not navigate without help.
At people who kept speaking about tomorrow as though it were obvious she would be part of it.
What if they really mean it?
Geet lay down with the book beside her.
For the first time, that possibility frightened her almost as much as being asked to leave.
Bollywood
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