Amulya Malladi - The Mango Season

“You are my favorite man, Nanna. I just didn’t want to lose you because I was in love with another man, the man with the wrong nationality and race. I know Thatha is going to disown me and-”

“He is?” Nanna interrupted me.

“It’s a gut feeling, not anything he said, but I know him and I know that this is not what he wants for me. That’s a battle I have lost. I’m worried that Ma will turn her back on me as well,” I confessed. “And even though she and I have never been best of friends, I came here to tell you all. I wanted so much for you to accept Nick, to accept Nick and me as a couple.”

“Don’t worry about Ma. She’s going to do what I’m going to do,” Nanna said with a small smile. “She’s your mother and she will always love you, no matter what you do. That’s a mother’s job.”

We looked at each other for a while, accepting each other, flaws and all, yet again. Some relationships you can’t sever.

“I am glad though that you didn’t marry him in the dark, like Anand married Neelima,” Nanna said quietly. “I am glad you had the courage to tell us. I would have preferred to hear about it earlier but at least you told us, so many others just wouldn’t have. This colleague of mine, his son lives in Europe, married a British girl and called them after the wedding… broke his heart.”

“I thought I broke yours.”

Nanna laughed. “Cracked it a little, but it is not broken. I am proud that you are who you are. I am happy that I raised you… because I raised you well.”

“I thought you were angry, felt that I stabbed you in the back, cheated you,” I told him.

“Well, last night I felt that way,” Nanna admitted. “But now… after drinking all night, I can see the light.”

“The clarity of the drunk?” I joked, and he laughed again. Yesterday night I had thought that he would never laugh again, at least never with me.

“We’re thinking of getting married this fall. Will you come?” I asked impulsively.

“Are you inviting me to your wedding?” Nanna asked, incredulous.

“Times have changed,” I said, realizing how ridiculous the situation was. My father had forever planned to marry me off and now when the time was here I was marrying myself off, while he was being invited as a guest.

“We will see,” he said, and I understood that he couldn’t commit himself.

“I should go to Thatha’s and tell them that I’m not going to be the next Mrs. Sarma,” I said, standing up.

“I’ll drive you,” Nanna said. “The liquor has worn off… Your daughter marrying a firangi is bad for the buzz.”

“What about him?” I asked, pointing to the sleeping Nate whose mouth was just a little open and drool was pooling, slowly trickling down his chin.

“He’ll be fine,” Nanna said. “Probably not the first time he is drunk and hung over. Now, on our way to Thatha’s, I want you to tell me all about Nate’s girlfriend. Is she at least Telugu?”

I hugged Nanna tightly then, let the floodgates open and sobbed in relief. He rubbed his cheek against my hair and I wasn’t sure if the wetness I felt was sweat or Nanna’s tears.

Sowmya was making buttermilk instead of coffee for the early-evening tiffin along with some almond biscuits. “Too hot for coffee,” she told me, as she poured water into the earthen pot in which she made yogurt every day.

“Where did Thatha go?” I asked, annoyed that he wasn’t there when I was ready to explain to him why I couldn’t marry Adarsh and why I had to tell him the truth.

“Something happened at the house construction… Some wall was put up that shouldn’t have been put up or something like that,” Sowmya said as she added powdered cumin and coriander along with a teaspoon of chili powder and salt to the earthen pot.

She churned the yogurt with a wooden mixer, tasting as she churned. “Will you drink this,” she asked, “or should I make some separate with sugar?”

“This is fine,” I said, smiling at the fact that she remembered I always drank buttermilk with sugar in it.

Lata strolled into the kitchen then, a slight waddle creeping into her walk as she massaged her back. “None of my previous pregnancies gave me this much trouble,” she muttered and then sighed when she saw me. “Why did you have to tell Adarsh everything? Your mother is waiting to kill you.”

It annoyed me that Adarsh had gone home and been a good boy, telling his parents the truth about my personal life, something I thought I had revealed to him to ease his hurt. I had believed there was a tacit understanding between us not to reveal our conversation to any of the elders. I felt cheated out of the money I paid for his chaat and ganna juice.

“Well, he told me that he had a Chinese girlfriend,” I countered, deliberately keeping the ex-girlfriend part out.

“Chinese?” Lata’s eyes widened, and she came and leaned against the wall beside me. “What, are there no Indians in the States for you all to meet?”

Neelima came into the kitchen right then, her eyes slightly puffed up and lethargy swirling around her like an irritating mosquito. “Can you make me some coffee, Sowmya?” she asked as soon as she was in. She sat down on the floor next to the large stone grinder. “I am so sleepy,” she complained.

“Happens in the first trimester,” Lata told her caustically. “And why are you and Anand so late? I thought you would be here in the morning. Sowmya and I had to mix the dried mango for the maggai all by ourselves.”

The scolding didn’t faze Neelima who wanted nothing more out of life at that instant than coffee. “My parents wanted us to have lunch with them,” she said.

“Here no one has eaten lunch,” Sowmya muttered. “ Nanna came and just took some of the morning’s curd rice and Amma is still having a headache. Radha Akka and I unnecessarily cooked so much rice and pappu.”

“We’ll have it tonight,” Lata said, and then focused on me. “How is your father doing?”

I smiled. “He’s going to be just fine.”

Lata put her hand on my shoulder and squeezed. “I think you are very brave,” she said. “It would have been easy for you to not have said anything… like Anand. But you did and that was very brave.”

I was surprised by her assessment. I didn’t feel very brave, just helpless in a situation that I couldn’t alter.

“I wish more women would stand up for what they want,” Lata finished with a smile.

“Maybe it’s time you did,” I suggested to her.

Sowmya finished churning the buttermilk and started pouring it in tall steel glasses that stood shakily on the not-so-smooth stone kitchen counter.

“Can you take this to your father and mother?” Sowmya pointed to two glasses.

“They are in the veranda-bedroom,” Lata told me. “Your mother is very angry. Good luck.”

I took the two glasses and went to find my parents. I knew my father was probably telling Ma that he was not going to raise any objections to who I wanted to marry. That was not going to be a pretty sight but I wasn’t going to back out after I had come this far. Even though Adarsh had annoyed the hell out of me he had shown me that hiding Nick from my family was detrimental to my relationship with Nick.

“Nothing doing,” Ma was yelling at Nanna. “She told Mallika… she told Mallika about this Nicku person. Mallika phoned everyone and told them. Sarita just called me here to tell me. What is she doing to us? Dragging our name in the dirt?”

I almost didn’t enter the bedroom, but took that heavy step across the threshold, pushing the slightly closed door. “Lassi,” I said, holding the glasses high.

Ma glared at me. “What, Priya, what are you doing to us?”

There were tears in her eyes and I wondered if they were there because she was sad or because she was angry. I never really got close to Ma the way daughters were supposed to get close to their mothers. I had managed to develop a very close relationship with my father but with Ma, things were better left unsaid. I think I never respected her or credited her with too much intelligence- that was for Nanna. Ma was the nuisance parent in my life, and even though Nate bitched about Ma, I knew that he always bought her a gift for her birthday, remembered my parents’ wedding anniversary, and sometimes just for the hell of it would bring home jalebis, Ma’s favorite sweet.