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He reached out and grabbed my hand. I stifled the urge to pull it away and didn’t even gag when he patted my hand with his hairy, sweaty paw. This was the new, mature me, who didn’t immediately assume that just because Deep’s hand was hairy and sweaty, the rest of him would be the same. Well, to be honest, I didn’t have to assume anything. After too many summers spent lounging in the pool together, I already knew exactly how hairy he was.
I choked down a whimper and waved him off with a smile. Then I resolutely made my way to my mother’s room.
It was close to ten pm, but my mother was a night owl. She was probably curled up under the covers with a plate of cookies, ready to binge-watch some Scandinavian detective series. I was right.
When I poked my head around her door, she hit the pause button on the remote and patted the side of her bed.
I crawled into her bed and put my head on her lap.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?”
“What? Can’t a daughter come to see her mother without any ulterior motive?”
I put out a hand to snag a cookie, and my loving mother swatted it away with her bejewelled fly swatter.
“Oww! That hurt, Ma! Are you sure you’re my real mother?”
“Who else would put up with you?” she asked drily.
Well, she had a point. I snatched the fly swatter from her hand, and threw it on the floor, for I had a feeling that my next words would definitely provoke her into throwing it at my head, and I didn’t want the lovely carved handle to leave a permanent scar on my face.
“Out with it! What did you do?”
I sat up and glared at her.
“I resent the tone, Ma! Why do you always assume that I did something wrong?”
“Twenty-five years of experience,” she retorted.
I scowled and got off the bed in a huff.
“I don’t have to stay here and take this. Good night,” I said grandly.
“You still haven’t told me what you did. Stop stalling and start talking, Jayshree,” she called out.
I sighed and pulled my hand away from the door. There was no escaping it.
“I’m meeting Deep for lunch tomorrow, Ma,” I said, softly.
My mother stared at me from over her glasses, and I don’t know what she saw in my face, but her brow furrowed in concern.
“Lunch… as in… a date?”
I shrugged.
“Maybe. I don’t know. He didn’t say.”
I could have smacked myself in the face for sounding so confused.
“Let me get this clear, Jayshree. If Deep did mean it to be a date, are you still willing to go ahead with it? Do you really want to date the man you and Veer call not-so-Deep?”
I shrugged again.
“I guess so.”
“That’s not very convincing.”
“Does it have to be? Why does every step I take have to be weighed and balanced, Ma? Can’t I be spontaneous for once?”
