Is It Me You’re Thinking Of? by Lakshmy Ramakrishnan

The phone vibrated against the dining room table, Arun leaned over, examined it and placed it into the back pocket of his jeans. He looked deep in thought afterword, as though he had read something he wasn’t expecting. I went back to placing the dinner dishes on the counter-top. Dinner was predictable simpleton food: dal tadka, brinjal fry and chapathi. My signature dish for a simple evening. I had always liked the combination as I was growing up and now as an adult am comfortable experimenting with different lentils and their flavours. Arun didn’t seem to mind whatever I spruced up in the kitchen. We were too early in our marriage so I couldn’t determine if I was pleased that my husband wasn’t surprised about my culinary finesse or whether I should be peeved that he simply wasn’t bothered about what I put together.

It was a Friday night, cool gusty winds were blowing through our French windows and into the dining room. On most nights, we ate at the kitchen counter-table, it was convenient compared to the fussy formal meals we had endured, post-wedding at our relatives’ houses. We sat in companionable silence, our knees barely grazing against each other, munching through the meal.

“Did you by any chance get time to send those thank-you notes to our guests?” I asked Arun, through a bite.

“Yes, I stopped at the post office by around 11 this morning. I had to go to the printing division and it was on the way.” He sipped a glass of water and went back to his plate. “A lot of people turned up, eh?”

“Yeah, I guess our parents’ went a bit overboard with the invitations. I think they were a bundle of emotions by the end of it.” It was true, our families appeared more excited than the two of us.

Don’t get me wrong, I was enthralled to be a bride and have a wedding, but our parents’ on the other hand, were, overly enthusiastic. “It was kind of cute and sad, really. I mean, they had been waiting to celebrate a wedding whole-heartedly for awhile now, especially with the debacle my sister created before hers. They never really got a chance to celebrate the ‘coming together’ of two families thing.” My sister, Ria, the eldest, had had her marriage fixed to Vijay, a guy she had known all throughout her schooling and college days. They got along well, our families had known each other for several years, hell, even I liked the thought of him being a brother in-law.

Fate had other plans however, or at least, my sister did, because she called off the wedding about 2 weeks before because she said she was in love someone else. Everyone was devastated, including Vijay, the poor guy was sportive about it but you could tell his heart had broken into several pieces. Ria eventually arm wrestled our parent’s and got married to Rohit (the colleague she figuratively left Vijay at the altar for). The two of them are happy and have a year old son. Vijay had probably suffered enough embarrassment because the following month, he opted for an assignment to the States. Last I heard, he started a live-in relationship with a daytime soap opera actress and hasn’t visited India since.

“Do you mind if I watch TV for a bit?” Arun asked as he rinsed the plates.

“Leave those in there, I’ll take care of them. Yeah, sure, go ahead, I have to make some calls anyway.”