Chapter Twenty-Three
KIRAN
“I think I might mix it up and get coffee today.” Sonam fanned herself with a menu.
“Shut up and order your chai,” Akash said.
“People can mix it up sometimes, nerd. I don’t always have to operate the same way,” Sonam defended.
“But you will,” Akash said.
She scoffed, and Payal and Kiran rolled their eyes at the bickering.
“So…I’m thinking about quitting my job.”
The three others all looked up at Payal’s slow pronouncement.
“Bored with the public relations business?” Akash asked.
“I want to chase my passion, you know? I love designing clothes, and I love styling my friends. I’d love to take a year to venture out and see what I can do with it. Maybe this is the time to start the line.”
“You would be amazing, Payal. Seriously,” Kiran encouraged. “You have to do this.”
“Thanks, K.”
“You would be great at it,” Sonam said. “You have a real eye for fashion, and you’re always impeccably dressed. If that’s where your heart is, do it. We’re in our twenties, and we should take the risk now, before we’re married and bound to obligation.”
“Do it, Payal. I’m sure my sister Laila would love to cover you for her magazine if you needed PR resources. It’s a great opportunity all around,” Akash said.
“You’ve been talking about this for years, and we knew it was coming. Do it,” Kiran said, voicing her approval once more for good measure. “You’ve been saving up to make a move.”
The enthusiastic responses inflated Payal’s chest, and she sat a little straighter. Her eyes lit up, and Kiran was thrilled to see Payal with more purpose and drive than she’d displayed working at her job at the PR firm.
“Hey, Payal,” an insanely attractive Indian guy—tall, straight nose, thin face, straight teeth, facial hair that was neatly trimmed and soaked in pomade to an inch of its life—addressed her from his spot in line.
Payal simply nodded and gave him a wave—with a smile any of the CMC could tell was the kind you gave a person you hoped would never call when they said things like, “We should hang out sometime.”
“Former hookup?” Sonam asked.
“No. We grew up in London together. Our families are close. His name is Ayaan.”
“He’s very cute,” Kiran said.
“He’s also about to suck face with the goddess that walked in…and trust me, he’s not that attractive, the manwhore.”
Kiran couldn’t tell if Payal genuinely knew the beautiful, sharply dressed Indian girl who walked in with five-inch heels or if she was, in her own alpha female way, a little possessive of her territory as an It Girl.
But when the girl started kissing Ayaan in a way that was more than PG-13 for a public space, Kiran immediately sided with Payal, writing off Ayaan and the girl as mere distractions from a more important conversation.
The others seemed to agree as they all turned their attention back to one another.
“So…speaking of chasing passions…” Sonam started. “Kiran, did you and Nash hang out again?”
“We’ve actually gone out a lot and—”
“You boned him, didn’t you?” Akash asked.
“What? No.” Kiran cringed. “That’s such a crass way of saying that, by the way.”
“It doesn’t change what’s going to happen. This is inevitable. Be careful.” Sonam pointed a biscotti at her.
“That’s quite the advice coming from someone who generally tells the world to fuck off,” Payal said. “And the girl who told me to go on a career adventure.”
Sonam stuck out her tongue. “I’m saying…Kiran is usually the careful one.”
“I don’t know, guys. I’m not sure about that.”
“Okay, well, since Akash interrupted and didn’t actually let you finish…What happened?” Payal shushed the others with her finger and gestured for Kiran to continue.
Kiran shot her a grateful glance before continuing. “Something’s shifted. I think about him all the time. Every time I spend time with him, I walk away wanting even more. And I tried to think of him as a friend, but when we’re together…”
“So much for being just friends,” Akash said.
“Are you considering dating him?” Sonam asked. “I mean, is this more than a fling? You’ve said you liked him and you’re deciding. Have you decided to go forward?”
“It’s…” Kiran struggled to explain the depths of what she felt for him. The boundaries drawn by her family all those years ago locked her vocal cords in place.
“You’re more than friends. You can’t deny that,” Akash said. “It’s already more than a fling.”
“Okay, fair, but do you see a future?” Payal said.
“Does it matter?”
“Don’t pretend you’re stupid, Kiran. You’re one of the smartest people we’ve met,” Sonam stated bluntly before dunking the biscotti in her chai. “You know what your limitations are.”
“I wish we could be exactly where we are forever. I wish we could be blissful and loving and in this bubble containing the two of us forever. Because he’s so wonderful and he makes me so happy…but the more I think about it, the more worried I get. And the more I want him.”
Payal watched her sympathetically, an understanding smile on her face. “That bubble sounds incredible. The world would be much happier if love were a place people could dwell in without any repercussions. But you’re going to have to make a choice soon.”
“I know. I can put it off for as long as I want, but it’ll always be there, hanging over me.”
“Have you told him about your sister? Have you shared your reservations with him?” Akash asked.
Kiran stayed silent.
“Kiran!” Sonam said.
“No…I said I don’t see her often and there was a little family drama. Then we changed the subject.”
“Wow, you sugarcoated that one…” Akash said.
“He’ll run if I tell him the truth and what’s expected of me.”
“And if he doesn’t?”
“Wouldn’t you?”
“As a guy, I would want to know. Because if I really liked a girl, I’d want to know we’re in it together and that we’d face the shit life has to offer…and if she’s worth it, I’ll do what it takes to be with her anyway.”
“Romantic words from someone who has never been in that position,” Sonam said.
“I’m telling you what I think from a neutral perspective, Sonam. Take it or leave it.”
“Well, we won’t tell you what to do, but we’ll be here for you for whatever you need,” Payal said.
Sonam raised an eyebrow. “‘We won’t tell you what to do’? Who are you right now? Of course we will. Kiran, the longer you put it off, the more it’ll hurt. We won’t tell you to date him or end it, but we will tell you that you have to do something. At the very least, you have to tell him the truth about your sister, or you guys start off on a lie.”
Payal rolled her eyes. “Date him. Who the hell cares?”
“My parents will. They’re scarred after Kirti.”
“Ah, well, when it comes to parental relationships, I’m probably not the best girl to give you advice. The most time I’ve spent with my mother was when I was in her uterus.”
Kiran offered her a reassuring pat on the hand to let her know she didn’t judge. Payal had more contact with her family over email than phone calls, and most of their conversations revolved around the family import and export business near London. She understood cultural expectations and family ones but not the love behind those boundaries.
“Is it really that bad if you date someone?” Akash asked. “You’ve done so much for your family, putting them up in that place in Delhi, getting amazing grades and coming to the United States, and always thinking about them. They could give you a free pass.”
“Girls have a different set of rules. Also, two minutes ago, you said you were neutral, and now you have an opinion,” Sonam said.
“Hey, boys get the fortune, so we have our own set of rules to abide by. We always have to make the first move. We always have to think about what the girl is going to say to her family about us…”
“Did you really just use those as arguments? Really?” Sonam snapped.
Akash tried to hold back a laugh. “No. I have two sisters, plus you three idiots. I am aware I’ve got it good. My point is that Kiran has done the job of a loyal and obedient child. She’s earned a choice of her own.”
Kiran’s head spun as she tried to line up the arguments in clean lines.
It was frustrating how many arbitrary guidelines there were for women. Women were supposed to be smart, strong, independent, forward, brave, fearless, and unique. But they weren’t supposed to shine too bright, be too bold, too sharp. They were supposed to fit in, have friends, make people think they were sexually invigorated but not actually be sexy for themselves, and respect everyone so they would appear soft and feminine. This double-edged sword was encased in a cultural sheath. Every country had customs and traditions that were supposed to be valued and cherished, and India was no different.
Truth be told, Kiran had always felt more like an outsider than her friends because she hadn’t been raised in the West. She was conscious of her accent sometimes—especially words like “water” or “vitamin,” where her w’s and v’s swapped themselves at will. She hated that she sometimes googled pop culture references on the sly when Akash or Sonam threw them around casually, so she would have a clue about what they were discussing. She despised the occasional judgmental stare down she would get on a subway from an Indian American who had grown up here, who clearly thought to themselves, “Well, you came from India. You’re more like my parent than my peer.”
While these spotlights on her foreign status were another part of her day, today they felt like inadequacies. Being an outsider had become exhausting. Even the Indian Americans she was best friends with couldn’t come up with a clear solution on what to do because she was so removed from their upbringings. She couldn’t collect her footing anywhere or identify with any one perspective. Instead, they blurred together and made her mentally rip apart her cleanly organized list of pros and cons and crinkle it into a ball.
No matter how many thoughts were collected on paper in this imaginary trash, however, one colored and glittery heart stood out at the bottom. This talk of chasing passions for Payal and the idea that she was twenty-eight years old with the weight of her family on her shoulders… It prompted Kiran to feel as though for once, she should pursue what she wanted. She wanted Nash. She missed him when they weren’t together. And a dim world wasn’t one she could go back to now that she’d seen the light.
She had to tell him.