What was wrong with her mother-in-law? Rachel wondered, looking at the closed door of her own bedroom. I have come to stay with you and Dhruv. And that’s all there is to say about that. It simply wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be. Parents didn’t just come live with their children.
Here they do, Rachel’s mind reminded her, and she wished she could slap the voice in her head. But people did do that here, they did it all the time. Or really, the other way around. People lived with their parents until their parents died, and by that point they were the parents, living with their children. Everyone just stayed layered on top of each other like a parfait until the parts ran together and life all tasted the same.
She was going out of her mind. Swati could not live with them forever. She tried to calm the rising tide of panic moving up her body. Panic made her vomit, and she didn’t want to do that. She checked her phone and saw Dhruv had texted her. Dhruv. Of course. Her husband. She had almost forgotten that he existed, and of course he would come home and they would talk and figure out what to do about this. Of course he wouldn’t allow this to happen. He would know what to say to Swati; they would figure this out. He always knew what the right thing was, especially here in India; he would know what to do now. She had a sudden desperate need to hear his voice, to tell him all about this, and she called him, but he didn’t pick up. It was fine. He would be home soon. They would talk. They would “sort it,” as he’d say. It would be done and dusted in no time.
Rachel drank deeply, finishing her glass of wine. She would have to order more. There, that was something she could do, something she could focus on. What was the wine store that delivered? Dhruv usually does it for me, she thought with a grimace. Here he had all the phone numbers, and he spoke Hindi, was even learning Marathi himself to get by. It was so easy to let him do things. He liked doing things, liked being in control, and Rachel, who had felt less and less sure of her life with every year, found immense comfort in Dhruv’s certainty. When Rachel thought of her younger self, she did not feel jealous of her skin or her weight or her ability to shrug off hangovers, but she did long for her previous certainty. It was so easy to be sure of things when you were twenty. Rachel had turned thirty just before they had flown to India and she was certain of nothing, except how nice it was to be with someone—Dhruv—more sure than she was.
Unable to find the number to call for wine tonight, though, she would have to content herself with rum. She poured herself a glass. Sipping, Rachel missed her mother, Ruth, with a sharpness that felt like physical pain. Rum was Ruth’s nightcap; she drank a glass, with ice, before bed on the weekends. Sometimes, when Rachel was alone in Brooklyn, she would call her mother on a Friday night and she would have a glass of wine with Ruth over the phone, in separate cities, a hundred miles away from each other. They could never do that now that Rachel was in India. It was morning for Rachel when Ruth was having her rum, and morning for Ruth now, as Rachel was comforting herself with alcohol.
Rachel wished she could call her mother. Ruth would just be sitting down to breakfast, the ten minutes or so that she took to eat every day. She could picture her, in a brightly textured sweater and knit pants, perfect for Philadelphia in October and for a woman who was always cold. But she knew if she called her mother too much, complained too often, Ruth would urge her to just come home.
She had married Dhruv so quickly, agreeing to love and honor and obey and move to India all in one go, changing her whole life in minutes. She had told her family, her friends, everyone she knew, that she knew what she was doing. To admit doubt now, to waver, that would be defeat. So she could only tell her mother good news, only talk about how great things were, how good Dhruv was, how kind Swati was to come get them settled in. That was how she would choose to see this, a temporary act of kindness, a stopover for Swati on her road to freedom. She had no problem with Swati’s decision to leave her husband; she knew nothing about the relationship beyond what Dhruv had said, so why should she? She only disliked where that decision had led her mother-in-law geographically.
Her mind raced to the logistics once again, thinking about the things she would need to buy to make their houseguest comfortable. What would Swati want to eat? She was a vegetarian, which in India also meant no eggs. Would she want something traditional? Would she want the lentils they had bought for dal, or a different kind? Would she want to make her own roti or did she like rice more? Everyone Rachel met drank milk, which she thought was bizarre because they were all adults, but would Swati want milk? Rachel was exhausted by all that she didn’t know, couldn’t plan.
Perhaps it was just some marital tiff, some fight that had gotten out of hand. She hadn’t thought that Swati was a dramatic person, but this must be some sort of episode. Rachel hadn’t known the right words, hadn’t said the right things, that was all.
Perhaps, she thought morosely, that would always be the case here. Dhruv had taken a three-year contract in Mumbai, with the thought that if they liked it, loved it, he would extend it, stay forever, maybe. But now the thought of that, which had been exciting, an adventure even, was depressing. Years and years of her life never saying the right thing, never knowing what was happening around her—could she live with that? Did she want to?
The door opened, and her husband walked in. For a moment she smiled at him, savoring the sight of him. His hair was ruffled and his tie loosened, sweat dripping down his temples. She loved him after work more than she loved him before work. Before work he was polished, professional, but after work he was hers. Always reserved, he would let go of things after the office, displaying anger, frustration, affection, in little bursts. She loved that; that was the part of him she craved the most and got the least, especially since they had moved. Unguarded emotion was rare from him, and therefore it was precious.
You were the one who thought happiness shouldn’t be a finite quality, a voice inside her whispered. He was looking at her happily, smiling at the rum in her glass, pouring himself a drink, eager to toast to the end of a long day. But it wouldn’t be. She wished she didn’t have to tell him, wished she could bask in his happiness for a little longer.
“Honey? There is something I need to tell you.”
Ten seconds later her words were interrupted by the sound of something shattering.
They would, indeed, need to buy new glasses at the rate they were breaking them.