I grinned, and he led me toward the dance floor. Crowds dispersed. Couples embraced. Prakash took me into his arms. His frame was stiff enough to let me know who was leading, even as he refused to drop his playful gaze. We sailed around the floor, almost as captivatingly as the two five-year-olds who were probably forced out there by some photo-hungry parents nearby. I didn’t need a mirror to know how perfect Prakash and I looked together.
Imagine my luck,
I thought.
I’ve found an attorney, who’s adorable, and funny, and a good dancer…and Indian? Tomorrow I’ll start auditioning matrimonial henna tatoo artists. On Monday morning I’ll look into the logistics of renting the horse upon which Prakash will arrive at our wedding.
A lesser man might have dropped me at the pivotal moment, but Perfect Prakash held me firmly, as I leaned into his arm and kicked back my leg. He dipped me so far that the ends of my hair touched the floor. I smiled for my parents, as much as for myself, while all the blood rushed straight to my head.
“So, Prakash…you’re handsome, you’re charming, and you’re a lawyer,” I began once he had pulled me up. “How is it possible that no woman has snatched you off the market yet?”
“Vina, there’s a perfectly simple explanation for that,” he replied, watching my form more than my eyes as he spun me around, and twisted me like a Fruit Roll-Up into one arm.
“I’m as
gay
as they come!”
I unraveled. I think I would have preferred to have been dropped.
M
y grandparents spoke little English, and lived with us while I grew up. Their presence guaranteed my fluency in Hindi and ensured a steady supply of Bollywood movies in the house. In comparison with what they considered
morally questionable
Hollywood films, the predictability of Indian cinema must have comforted them. Because while the actors rotate, the story never changes.
Bad first impressions inspire mutual disgust between the bratty rich girl and the rebel boy from the wrong side of the tracks. This disgust evolves through flirtation into puppy love, after she offers her silk scarf to bandage his wound one day, which he earned while fixing the engine of her car that had coincidentally broken down by the side of the road right in front of his home. The pair falls in love and meets in secret to perform choreographed dance numbers. Changing outfits between the ballads they sing at river banks and on mountaintops, they end each number with an almost-but-not-quite kiss, while peasants dance spontaneously around them. All hell breaks loose when their fathers—inevitably embroiled in a vendetta which began long before they were born—learn of their torrid romance. Someone fights, someone is kidnapped and someone is warned to stay away from the girl. Girl throws tantrum, mother shares wisdom, and after more fighting, someone is nearly killed. The parents decide to forget about the past, agreeing that love matters most, and throwing an enormous wedding, with more dancing, much singing and still no kissing.
Basically, it’s
Romeo and Juliet
with more choreography and less sexual content. And unlike
Romeo and Juliet,
Bollywood lovers always have a happy ending. My parents had an arranged marriage in India approximately two weeks after their parents introduced them. They don’t use a word like love, but my father cannot sleep when my mother is ill, and I have never seen her sip her morning tea without him. To say publicly that they loved each other, my father once told me, would be like taking out a press release to announce that water was wet.
No man had ever understood why I cling to the idea of a happy ending, even as I claim to have accepted the slim chances of it. These guys told me that I made no sense, or that my fixation on how things
ought to be
could easily mean I’d end up alone. Lately I worried that if they turned out to be right, I would have no one to blame but myself.
Well, that will teach me not to use an eyelash curler,
I thought, blinking rapidly while I ran toward the coat check. Judging by the expressions of the hotel guests I rushed past, I must have looked a mess. Conveniently, the eyelash which came loose as I f led the dance floor had settled across the inner rim of my eyelid. And barring a knuckle to my socket, nothing was gonna pull that sucker out. With mascara streaming down my quivering left cheek, I fought off the beginnings of a facial spasm. For anyone who resents our shiny, f lowing locks, let me assure you: What Indian women save in trips to tanning booths and melanoma clinics, we lose in the battle against our follicles. All that waxing, plucking, threading and tweezing could reduce a grown man to tears.
I banged on the courtesy bell while leaning into the coatroom, searching for some hint of a coat check girl.
“Vina.” My mother grabbed me by the arm and yanked me around to face her. “
Vot
are you
dewing hir?
” When her voice developed the Punjabi twang, it always meant I had stepped out of line.
“Looking for a coat check girl.” I avoided her eyes.
“
Vee thot
something had gone wrong.” She overgestured. “You just ran off and left poor Prakash standing like a dummy on the dance floor! Papa thought you had an upset stomach, but I assumed you were feeling sick from those ten martinis.”
“It was three martinis, Mother.” I rubbed my right arm below the shoulder. For four feet and ten inches of relatively sedentary maternal mass, she was actually freakishly strong.
“And this is something
forr a vooman
to be proud
off?
”
“No.” I banged not-so-courteously on the bell, and noticed that my throat was feeling tight.
“Oh,
beti.
” She softened, her face melting into concern. “Are you all right?” Clearly she had misinterpreted the state of my face.
“Yes, Mom.” I took a breath and faked a smile. “I’m fine.”
“Come here.” She produced a handkerchief from behind her bra strap, and proceeded to dab at my cheek.
“Mom.” I jerked my head away, like an adolescent avoiding a maternal spit-shine. “I’m fine.”
“If you are fine, then why are you leaving?” Her eyebrows arched. “Did he do something
wrong?
”
“No, Mom.” I shook my head. “It’s nothing like that. Prakash was a total gentleman.”
“Then explain your behavior, Vina.” She gathered up the pleats of her sari, and ref lung it over a shoulder, before settling a hand on each hip. “Why are you behaving this way? Don’t you know how much of an insult this is to his family? In front of everyone?”
“Mom, trust me. We’re not a match.”
“
Vy
not, Vina? Tell me
vy
not? You are both Indian, and professional, and he is very handsome, and he comes from a good family.
Vot
more do you
vont?
And please, Vina, don’t start talking about your so-called Chemistry and Love. You are not a child, and you know that these things take time. Your father is going to ask me why you are being so unreasonable.” She cocked her head to one side. “Or…wait a minute.
You
didn’t say anything wrong,
did you?
”
I gritted my teeth.
“No, Mom. Of course not. Of course I didn’t say anything
wrong.
” I couldn’t stop blinking, or cursing myself for choosing this nightmare over Cristy’s rodeo. “The problem with Prakash is that he’s…”
“
There
you are!”
“Oh! Hello,
beta.
How are you?” my mother cooed at Prakash. It was a frighteningly instant transformation.
“Hello, Auntie. You must be Vina’s mother. It’s very nice to meet you. That’s a lovely sari you’re wearing. Is it organza? It must have been made in Delhi, right? My mother says that you can’t find such good quality anywhere in New York, Jackson Heights or otherwise.”
He was shameless. She was beaming. I was at a loss.
“Thank you,
beta
. Thank you. I’ll go and say hello to your father.” She smiled. I tugged at my eyelid, which made a sucking noise. Glaring at me before she spun on her heels, my mother bounced giddily away. I rolled my eyes and gave up on the coat check girl, opting instead to search for a concierge.
Prakash whispered, while he watched my mother depart: “Vina, we have to talk.”
I paused, and twisted my neck toward him. “
We?
There is no
we,
you lunatic. Meanwhile, you and I have nothing to say to each other.” I pivoted away from him.
“You have to listen to me!” He grabbed my shoulders and pushed me backward through the doorway of the coatroom. My cheek spasmed, my eye twitched and I struggled for breath. Being half-blind, half-drunk and immobilized by my four-inch heels, I forgot all my fight-or-f light instincts. So rather than reacting I chose to hyperventilate, while trying to remember the protocol.
Was I supposed to poke him
in the groin? Knee him in the eyes? Kick him in the gut? Twist and pull? Scream for help? Stop, drop and roll?
“Vina, you don’t understand!” he said, cornering me in the small room.
Hoping for an emergency exit nearby, I lost balance and fell into a pile of coats. Prakash collapsed on top of me. The snapping of my left heel was practically expected, but the groping by the coats I landed on was most certainly not. Rolling Prakash off of myself, I struggled to my feet, and sprang into a defensive judo-stance. (Note to self: Stay away from
Austin Powers
reruns on cable.)
From below the pile of coats, a giggle and a pair of heads emerged. And one of the heads had something to say for itself. “Heeeeeey baby, don’t be like that. There’s always room for one more person at this party.”
I blinked to confirm what I was witnessing: the missing coat check girl grinning over a bare shoulder while straddling the bartender, who raised an eyebrow as soon as he noticed that I wasn’t alone. And I could’ve sworn I heard him add, “Or room for
two more,
should I say?” as I darted for the door.
With one hand to my forehead, I sprinted across the lobby, slowing only to throw the broken shoe into the trash. Soon enough I tripped on the other one, and crashed into the lobby’s glass doors, badly skinning my knee. Rather than taking the moment to feel sorry for myself, I remembered that Prakash was close behind. I clambered to my feet, threw open the doors and leaped into a waiting taxi, with just enough time to hurl my other heel out the window before the cab driver gunned the gas.
“My parents don’t know that I’m gay,” Prakash yelled at the window as the cab began to pull away.
“I don’t know why he thinks that’s my problem,” I told the cabbie, who grinned and whisked me safely home.
“
C
hica
, who has time for a four-hour Sunday brunch and still manages to pay their rent in this town? That’s what I want to know.” Cristina dragged a chair over to our table at Starbucks. She paused to lay her cell phone and her BlackBerry beside my own, and then checked her pulse on a wrist sensor before acknowledging Pamela. “Oh, no offense, Pam.”
Cristina had an obsessive relationship with her physical fitness, but she also had a point. She and I had spent the better part of our Sundays during the last four years hidden in our offices, catching up on work before Monday morning. In our industry, that didn’t make us competitive; it made us competent. And in an effort to burn off some of the resulting stress, Cristina had become a genius at self-defense. She mastered everything from model-mugging (assault scenarios simulated by mock-attackers in padded suits) to Krav Maga (hand-to-hand combat training based on the principles of the Israeli national army). An even more unfortunate habit of hers was using Spanish words and phrases when trying to convince me of something. She was reminding me of that additional camaraderie all ethnic women supposedly shared. It was unforgivably manipulative. Sure, I had thrown in the occasional
Schmoopie
or
Honey
when trying to steer a steak-loving boyfriend toward a Thai restaurant (because the variety would make him a better man), or to convince him that rubbing my feet could stave off the effects of carpal tunnel (I swear, I had read that somewhere). But I would never have stooped so low as to use any of these tactics on my girls.
Pam, on the other hand, hailed from a very different school of thought; a school that didn’t bear the burden of rent. Her father—still guilt-ridden over leaving her mother for an au pair twenty years ago—bought her a one-bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side as a college graduation present. The arrangement kept her in clothing that Cristina and I wouldn’t dare buy for ourselves, even though we each earned roughly three times Pamela’s salary. But I guess Pam needed it more than we did; Chanel, Gucci and Polo were standard dress code at Windsors, the devastatingly upper-crust art auction house where she worked for pennies, and the occasional invite to some of the swankiest social events this side of the Riviera. It was a good arrangement for Cristy and myself, too, since some of those invitations trickled down to us. Each event held the promise of champagne and the company of international aristotrash who probably assumed that our presence meant we were royalty ourselves.
“None taken.” Pamela waved the comment away like so many pesky fruit f lies, and then scrunched up her nose and peered suspiciously into the whipped cream covering my Caramel Macchiato. “Is that
decaf?
”
“Yes. It is.” I stirred the caramel carefully, trying not to risk whipped cream deflation. Then I realized I should probably have resented the judgment in her tone. “So what?”
Despite the god-awful preppy clothing Pamela had seemed to know it all nine years ago, when she strolled into my freshman dorm room. It was day two of the fall semester. She breezed in, made herself comfortable among my unopened boxes, pointed to a literature textbook and asked if I was taking the Friday class with Professor Feineman. I nodded.
It was a bad idea,
she told me,
unless I wanted to miss out on Thursday-night parties just to be awake in time for the only 8:00 a.m. class requiring attendance.
As effortlessly as she said it, she lifted a heap of Ramen noodles neatly into her mouth, using chopsticks. Never having seen anyone my own age handle them properly before, I naturally assumed this was a woman from whom I could learn. Time cured me of that misconception, but Pamela’s perspective had narrowed while her opinions had sharpened with age.
“
So…
you never drink decaf.” Cristina sided with the enemy.
“Yes, I drink decaf.” I scrolled through old messages on my BlackBerry.
“When?” Pam asked, picking imaginary lint off of my shoulder. “When do you drink it?”
“I don’t know…sometimes. Who cares when I drink it? Why does it matter?”
“
Hijole
…because you’ve been acting weird lately, and we’re worried about you.” Cristina thrust her chin out at me.
“Why?” I asked. “What’s the problem? Maybe I don’t want to get myself all riled up.”
“All riled up…with coffee? Most of your blood has already been replaced by it, Vina. And do you even hear yourself? You sound like you’re about sixty years old.”
“Decaf is not like you, Vina,” Pam interrupted, “any more than letting your parents set you up on a blind date is. And you know that I don’t have anything against you meeting potentially compatible guys. However, we want to talk about what’s really been going on with you. You’ve been frazzled lately.”
Frazzled?
I thought.
If they had any idea what I had gone through before I arrived at Starbucks that morning, they would consider me incomprehensibly composed.
Three hours earlier, I was feeling even more exposed before a larger and more sympathetic audience. I probably could have been better prepared, but who would’ve guessed that there were so many “Closeted Claustrophobes” in New York City?
“I, umm…my name is Maria,” I had stuttered when thirty pairs of eyes collided upon me. “And I’m a Closeted Claustrophobe. It’s been about eight hours since my last attack.” I cleared my throat, making a mental note to make sure none of these weirdos tried to follow me home.
Admitting that I had a problem was difficult enough. I didn’t see the need to share my name with the motley crew who had gathered in the basement of St. Agnes’ 13th Street Church that Sunday morning. I could just imagine being outed when I bumped into one of these lost souls while strolling through Bergdorf’s with my mother.
You wouldn’t have to struggle to fill your time with such silly things if you were married and settled into life,
she would explain, before shaking her head at whatever heels I was considering, and strolling off in search of a Talbots.
Emotional problems, according to my parents, were a luxury of the lazy, self-indulgent American. I had learned this early about my parents, and decided around the same time that the best way to maneuver my Indian and American cultural identities would be to keep certain things about myself to myself. I knew that I had overreacted in the coatroom. And I was as sure that I needed help as I was mortified to have finally come looking for it. Twisting in my plastic seat, I cupped the bruise on my knee while committing the Five
C
s of the Closeted Claustrophobes to memory:
Check for exits, Close your eyes, Count to ten, Calm your nerves, Center yourself.
Delilah, the middle-aged receptionist who spoke before me, teared up twice while describing the torture of her cramped bus ride. Arthur, the elderly man preceding her, explained how his frustration over claustrophobia had resulted in an anger management problem, which was magnified by his Tourettes, and had effectively ended his acting career. Already I was glad that I had come, since I didn’t have it nearly as bad as any of these freaks. Things were going smoothly, especially in comparison to my first attempt at one of these meetings. Three months earlier I stopped short of entering the doorway when I overheard the Rage-aholics director threatening the Claustrophobes director with physical harm unless he surrendered the larger, first-floor room to the Fear of Heights support group, whose director was his ex-wife.
I was wondering how the albino to my left could call himself claustrophobic, given such a determined obliviousness to my right of personal space, when I saw a familiar figure coming through the door. It was my cousin, Neha.
“The government stole my shoes!”
Arthur announced without warning, startling everyone, including himself.
I was halfway to the Starbucks before my seat had probably gone cold.
“He’s gay?”
Cristina blurted out, nearly choking on her drink. “Wow…I knew your parents were a little out of touch with what you’re looking for in a man, but that’s ridiculous!”
“Obviously they didn’t
know
he was gay.” I spoke up to dismiss the uninvited pity rushing at me from our neighbors.
“Do
his parents
know?” Pam leaned in and whispered, as if the topic were a ref lection on her.
“Of course not.”
“Que locura,”
Cristina decided. “That’s pretty twisted. So much for counting on those underground, Indian-network background checks.”
“There is nothing underground about the Indian network,” I tried to explain. “And it has nothing to do with the background check, anyway. As far as the background check went, everything was perfect. Generally, Indian parents don’t consider, or even think about, their children’s sexualities or sexual preferences. Some things are just assumed.”
“Seriously.” Pam shook her head at Cristy, ignoring me entirely. “You said he was thirty, right? Talk about living in denial.”
Was she referring to Prakash’s parents or to him? In a way, I felt bad for the guy; I could relate. Our parents grew up in a culture that rejected the concepts of premarital sex and romance. Non-arranged marriages occurred so infrequently among their generation that they were referred to as “love marriages.” Like most first-generation Indian-Americans, I had come to accept that my parents could never acknowledge my
premarital sexuality
any more than Prakash’s parents could comprehend his
homosexuality.
My theories on the value of self-discovery through romantic misadventure were lost on mom and dad, so I kept my mouth shut about my relationships, especially the fifty percent that involved non-Indian boys. And somewhere around age fifteen I decided to take the same stance on my claustrophobia.
“Look, I’m not pissed off that he’s gay.” I concentrated on my empty cup. “I’m pissed off that he led me on.”
“What a tease.” Cristina grinned.
“Basically,” I said, sitting up straighter. “But it doesn’t matter. Prakash was only a blip on my radar. An irrelevant data point. My plan holds.”
Two blank pairs of eyes stared back at me.
“Oh, God. Are you still talking about that ‘thirty months until thirty’ garbage?” Cristina practically yelled.
“First of all, it’s not garbage. Ignoring my biological clock won’t make it go away. And I’m finished wasting time. I have to be honest with myself.” I raised my chin toward Pamela. “And I know
you
can at least understand where I’m coming from.”
To Pamela,
thirty and alone
was roughly translated as
homeless and afflicted with a disfiguring, terminal, sexually transmitted disease.
She had been engaged-to-be-engaged with William, a Harvard-educated lawyer of the lightly pin-striped variety, since the beginning of time; or at least since the beginning of college, when she woke up in his bed on the morning after the Head of the Charles regatta. Although it never occurred to her to question his claim that his parents’ divorce made him maritally gun-shy, I was sure that it also never occurred to her that there was anything wrong with treating the search for a mate like the search for an apartment. A good deal was a good deal, period. And the potential for long-term appreciation far outweighed momentary attractiveness.
“You’re right, Vina. I do understand where you’re coming from. And I do not want to see you single at thirty.” She eyed me like a child who had lodged a marble up her own nose. “I also agree with you that we
should
all be honest with ourselves. So let’s be honest…let’s talk about what this is really about. Jon.”