The Mango Season

“Maybe it’s time you did,” I suggested to her.

Sowmya finished churning the buttermilk and started pouring it in tall steel glasses that stood shakily on the not-so-smooth stone kitchen counter.

“Can you take this to your father and mother?” Sowmya pointed to two glasses.

“They are in the veranda-bedroom,” Lata told me. “Your mother is very angry. Good luck.”

I took the two glasses and went to find my parents. I knew my father was probably telling Ma that he was not going to raise any objections to who I wanted to marry. That was not going to be a pretty sight but I wasn’t going to back out after I had come this far. Even though Adarsh had a

“Nothing doing,” Ma was yelling at Na

I almost didn’t enter the bedroom, but took that heavy step across the threshold, pushing the slightly closed door. “Lassi,” I said, holding the glasses high.

Ma glared at me. “What, Priya, what are you doing to us?”

There were tears in her eyes and I wondered if they were there because she was sad or because she was angry. I never really got close to Ma the way daughters were supposed to get close to their mothers. I had managed to develop a very close relationship with my father but with Ma, things were better left unsaid. I think I never respected her or credited her with too much intelligence- that was for Na

Why was it that we had divided our affections like this? It was a subconscious thing because when I looked inside myself I could feel that Na

When I was a little girl, and Nate had yet to be born, I used to imagine that Ma was actually my stepmother. Na

“I’m really sorry,” I said sincerely. “I thought Adarsh would be discreet since he told me about his Chinese girlfriend. I really didn’t think he’d put out an ad in the newspaper.”

Ma seemed to be surprised by my apology but she recovered from that fast. “So if he tells something you have to counter it? Don’t you have any shame?”

“What has shame got to do with this?” Politeness be damned. The woman was as usual getting on my nerves.

“And why would you tell Murthy Auntie about this? Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“She asked about Adarsh and I told her the truth,” I said, now regretting my rash decision of telling Murthy Auntie about Nick. I had done it because I was angry with the family, irritated with Murthy Auntie’s interrogation. It was juvenile and I was now embarrassed.

“But I’m sorry I told her,” I said, my eyes downcast. “It was a stupid thing to do.”

“She told everyone,” Ma said, and then added sarcastically, “No need for Adarsh to put it in the papers, you did a fine job yourself. Why don’t you yell it off the rooftops?”

“Radha,” Na

“Sorry?” Ma looked at my father in bewilderment. “Sorry does not make this right, Ashwin. She is insulting us and”-she turned to look at me-“get out of here and I don’t ever want to see your face again. If you marry this American, that is it, you are never welcome in my house anymore.”

My mouth dried up because she was imparting the small knives with great precision and they were striking me the way she wanted them to. I may not love her as much as I loved my father but she was my mother. How can a mother turn away from her daughter?

“Radha.” Na

“What, Ashwin, I had such great dreams… such hopes, all shattered.” Ma started to weep, the words pouring out of her through hiccups and tears. Na

“Everything will be okay,” he murmured into her hair, and smiled sadly at me.

The lump in my throat burst and I set the glasses of lassi down on the bedside table. Na

Ma was the first to push us both away. She wiped her face with her pallu and looked at me with eyes that glistened with the aftermath of tears and rage. “Are you really marrying this American boy?”

I held on to my father as I turned to face her. “Yes.”

Ma nodded. “When?”

“This fall. Maybe October.”

Ma nodded again and walked out of the bedroom.

I leaned into Na

By the time a tired Thatha came home, di

Everyone was waiting for me to reveal my defection yet again and to tell Thatha about my meeting with Adarsh, my improper conversation, and my impending marriage to a man they would all refer to as the firangi.

Sowmya was serving leftovers from lunch but no one, not even Anand who always had a problem with leftover food, complained.

“Lata’s ultrasound and amnio test is tomorrow,” Jayant said, I think to stop everyone from thinking about my American fiancé.

Thatha looked up at Lata and smiled. “It will be a boy,” he said confidently.

Lata, the first to finish di

Jayant stood up, pushing his chair away sharply, its four legs squeaking against the floor’s polished stone, a look of total panic on his face. “What do you mean you won’t do it? Sixteen weeks, they can tell the sex in sixteen weeks these days.”

Lata moved and the curd rice mixed with water sloshed on her plate. “I don’t want to know the sex of this baby.”

“But you said that if it is a girl you would…” Jayant stopped himself from revealing too much but it was already too late, everyone was privy to what they had decided would be the fate of a baby girl.

“I want to have this child and I want it to be a surprise like it was when Shalini and Apoorva were born,” Lata said and left for the back yard to put the plate in the tub for the maid to clean the next day.

While she was gone, Thatha demanded an explanation from Jayant. “What is going on, Jayant? If it is a girl… You know we want a boy.”

Jayant threw his hands up in exasperation. “I don’t know what to do. I… will try and talk to her.”

“Why?” Sowmya asked and surprised everyone with her voice. “If she doesn’t want to know, we should not force her. We are not that kind of a family.”