You guys, it's only one more week to D-Day! To get y'all in the mood, here's a little teaser for you.
We’d made it to the reception in time for the diya
dance, which went amazingly well despite the confusion my absence created in
the choreography. Now, almost every guest and their mothers were wiggling their
tuches off on the dance floor as the DJ brought the tent down with
eardrum-busting music.
I shifted, easing my outstretched leg off the
footstool Neal had found for me, and gingerly placed my burnt foot on the
floor. I hated the feeling of pins and needles in my appendages—especially when
it happened during a particularly long and drawn out deposition or trial—thus I
kept shifting positions.
“Okay?” Naira shouted into my right ear.
I nodded, smiling. I’d tried—we’d all tried to get
Naira to dance but she was determined to demur. Jet lag had fatigued her,
apparently. I didn’t believe her.
“Go. Dance!” I poked her again.
“I’d rather keep you company,” she said, her lips
curving in a dreamy smile.
She wasn’t jet-lagged. She was tipsy, I decided in
amusement.
We’d been guzzling the infamous Girlfriend
Cocktails since dinner. The GFC had been invented by our very own Naira in
sophomore year, if you could believe it. The jalapeño-spiked cocktail recipe
had been liberally shared with all the bartenders working within a six-block
radius of NYU. The bartender at Lavinia’s wedding was the latest recipe
recipient.
“Are you heading straight back to Mumbai after the
wedding?” I simply had to know if she’d come just for the wedding.
The dreaminess in her eyes dimmed. She shook her
head. “I have things to take care of in New York. I’m going to be around for a
month. Probably longer if all goes well.” She brightened again. “Fun, right? We
can catch up.”
“Of course, we’ll catch up. What things?” Probably
something to do with the criminal.
She flapped her hand at the speakers blaring out
remixed Bollywood songs. “It’s too long a conversation to get into tonight. Or
shout out.”
I nodded. True. A wedding wasn’t the place to hold
an interrogation. If Naira was going to be in town for a while, we’d have
plenty of opportunities for confessions and cross-examinations. Still,
questions and thoughts kept hammering inside my skull. And I was dying to tell
her about Neal and the surrogacy. She was going to be gobsmacked. Happy
gobsmacked. Naira was as baby mad as my husband.
Speaking of my husband, Neal was headed for our
table, a whiskey in his hand. He’d been schmoozing with some menfolk at the bar
ever since the dancing had started. But every once in a while, he’d come by to
check on my foot. He stopped behind my chair, bent to give me a sweet, whiskey-laced,
inverted kiss.
“Need anything?” He straightened with a final
press of his lips on my forehead. His question included Naira, but she’d turned
her gaze away from us. To give us privacy.
My amusement spiked. She was still a prude.
“You guys don’t need to babysit me. Go and dance.
Have fun,” I said, making eyes at my husband, hoping he’d take the hint and ask
Naira to dance. This business of Naira not wanting to dance like some tragic
widow was rubbish, and I was having none of it.
“But I’m having so much fun babysitting you,”
Naira teased.
Neal tossed his whiskey back, set the tumbler down
and gallantly held his hand out to Naira. Attaboy! “Come
on, lass. I may not be anywhere near your world champion status, but I promise
you, I’m not a bad dancer.”
“Oh no. That’s not even… You don’t have to… I don’t
want to dance. Really.” She looked at me pleadingly to rescue her.
I made a shooing motion with my hand. “Just go. It’s
high time you both get to know each other. And what better way to do it than
dancing together? That’s how we became friends with Lavinia and the gang,
remember? Go. Let loose. It’s silly for all of us to sit around and growl at
the world.”
Then, my husband turned on his full Scottish
charm and within two minutes flat, he was leading my best friend onto the dance
floor.
© Falguni Kothari, The Object of Your Affections
