I shrug. “I don’t know why they’re friends, really. Just that they’ve been for as long as I remember. Well … Hani was on her side, obviously.”
“Hani thought you cheated on the test?” Nik’s voice goes up as she says it.
“Well … not exactly.”
“So …”
“She … I don’t know. She kept saying she was confused. She didn’t know who to believe.”
“And then you two broke up?”
Instead of answering, I put another forkful of noodles into my mouth and begin to chew. At least that’s keeping the lump from my throat, and keeping the tears at bay.
“So … you broke up with her, huh?” Nik goes back to her pad thai. “You know, Ishu—I know you’re a lot of things … abrasive, closed-off, cold, a little mean-spirited sometimes, jealous, definitely, and for sure—”
“Nik!”
“Sorry.” Nik smiles. “I just never thought you were a fool. Cleverness is something you’ve always had going for you.”
“What are you talking about?” I ask.
“Well … you just gave Aisling everything. You gave up the girl you care about and want to be with instead of fighting for her, or even explaining your side of the story to her. You sent her right to Aisling. Why would she believe you when you gave up on her so easily?” Nik isn’t looking at me. She’s just taking small bites of noodles as she speaks.
“We were never even together to begin with, Nik. The whole thing … it was all a lie. I thought at least she could be a friend, but … she’s not even that. She wasnevergoing to believe me,” I say. “I bet Aisling has already spun some lies to make Hani believe that she isn’t actually at fault. That it’s all me, actually. She’s … she’s different when she’s with her white friends. She tries to change herself to be more like them, to fit in or whatever. I don’t even know if I want to be with someone like that.”
Nik settles me with a glare. “You can hardly be angry with her for that.”
“Yes, I can,” I say, settling Nik with a glare of my own.
“It’s not like you’re always exactly yourself. You do things just because Ammu and Abbu think you should. Would you have let Aisling and Principal Gallagher walk all over you like that if Ammu and Abbu hadn’t been there?”
“Well, no. But that’s different. They’re my parents.”
“My point, dear sister, is that we all have people who we bend ourselves for the approval of. For you and me, it’s Ammu and Abbu. For Hani, it’s her friends. We all need to fit in, or need to be loved, or need approval. You and Hani aren’t that different, if you think about it.”
Nik is wrong. I know she is. I’m not bending myself or being someone I’m not because of Ammu or Abbu. They’ve never asked me to be what I’m not, have they? They didn’t ask me to be Head Girl, but … would I have tried to be Head Girl if I didn’t think it would get me their approval?
The noodles suddenly taste like cardboard in my mouth. I gulp down the mouthful I was chewing and push the rest of it away.
“Anyway, I know you were more than just ‘fake dating’ Hani,” Nik says matter-of-factly.
“I wasnot.” I cross my arms over my chest, but I guess my defensiveness is not convincing because Nik smiles.
“You obviously care about her,” she presses.
I shake my head, because yeah, maybe I do. But I don’twantto. If all of this has proved anything, it’s that Hani and I aren’t a good fit. That I should have never given weight to my feelings. Maybe then, all of this wouldn’t hurt so bad.
“Can we move on and talk for a second about you and this wedding? Are Ammu and Abbu really not going to come?”
Nik sighs, and pushes away the rest of her pad thai too. Like this conversation has immediately made her lose her appetite. “Look … I told them that … I’m not going back to university. That was the last straw for them, I guess. They said they were never going to come to my wedding if Rakesh and I were veering my life off course.” She shrugs like the whole thing is no big deal, but I can see her hands shaking underneath the table. I reach forward and take her hands in mine.
“Why aren’t you going back to university? Is it … are you …”
“Ishu … I never told you this, but … I never wanted to study medicine. Or … maybe I did. I don’t know.” Nik shakes her head. “The thing is, I was so caught up in what Ammu and Abbu wanted that I never spent a second thinking about what I wanted. They convinced me that studying medicine and going to UCL would be the best thing I could ever do with my life. I wanted to make them proud, and I was so used to competing. With you, with other students at school. So I just went along with it, and it was only when I got there, when I was in university, that I realized I hated it all. That I hated everything that we had been doing, really.”
She heaves a sigh and gives my hands a squeeze. I think it’s to give herself strength more than anything else. “My first year at university was awful. I was doing terribly in all of my classes and after competing and winning my entire life it was like … everything was upside down. And I was so determined to succeed in something that I didn’t even like or want that I became depressed, I stopped eating, stopped … taking care of myself, mentally and physically. Thank God I met Rakesh.”
“He helped?”
