Gina approached her parents’ wooden front door and prepared to go to war. Okay, maybe she was exaggerating a little. They all had to move forward, she knew that, but the future for her and her family was still so shrouded in fog, she couldn’t see a clear path.
She fidgeted with her jacket. Was she wearing the right clothes? Did black jeans, olive-green shirt and a black jacket look too gay? She shook her head. It didn’t matter what she wore. Her parents didn’t see that. She might as well have come wrapped in a rainbow flag, because since she came out that’s all they saw. Gina was no longer a successful business woman. She was simply gay. It was the only label that counted.
However, the only way to combat that was to talk to them. Communicate. Make them see she was still the same person she always was. Easier said than done.
Gina knocked on the door of their detached house with garage. Both her parents’ Renault and her uncle’s flash Mini were there, which meant her journey hadn’t been for nothing. That was good at least, because she hadn’t told them she was coming. It didn’t stop Gina’s heart clattering in her chest as she heard footsteps behind the door. When it opened, she braced herself for her mother’s disapproval.
Instead, she got her uncle. His dark hair needed a cut, but he immediately broke into a grin.
“Gina! What the hell are you doing here? We were just talking about you! Happy birthday!” He stood back, beckoning her in.
She stepped over the threshold. The scents of garlic and onions frying in the kitchen wafted into her nostrils, along with cumin, coriander, cardamon and turmeric. It was such a familiar smell from her childhood. Gina missed her mum’s cooking.
Then Deepak hugged her so hard, he lifted her off the floor. There were only nine years between them, hence he’d never quite been a full uncle to her. More like an older cousin. A friend. Someone else who understood how powerful the disapproving gaze of her mother could be. Deepak had put up with it all his life, too.
He put her down, his smile so genuine, it made Gina smile, too. Her eyes swept the familiar hallway. Photos of her parents’ Punjab village on the wall, along with a larger one of the whole family in front of the Taj Mahal. She and her siblings had all been teenagers, as their miserable faces showed. By contrast, her parents were smiling like they’d won the lottery. The shoe racks were still on the left, with indoor slippers for family and guests.
“I can’t believe you’re here. I miss you coming home. It’s fabulous to see you.” He leaned in. “Plus, you look at least 20 per cent gayer than when I last saw you.” He gave her a wink.
Gina’s heart swelled. She couldn’t help but laugh. “Can you not say that when Mum’s around?”
“Purely between you and me,” Deepak replied.
Gina squeezed one of his pert biceps, the arm of his blue T-shirt wrapped tightly around it. “Mum told me you’d built a gym. Looks like it’s paying off.”
Deepak flexed both arms in a superhero pose.
Gina rolled her eyes, then shed her yellow Converse and swapped them for some white sliders.
“Who is it, Deepak? If it’s Nihal, tell him we’re still waiting for the quote before he can start on the windows. It’s how these things work. Quote first, work and payment second.”
Hearing her mother’s voice made Gina still. Her power to make Gina quake was undiminished. But Gina wanted to take control of this situation. Not be outmanoeuvred by a five-foot matriarch with a steely stare.
“It’s not Nihal, Mum. It’s me.” Gina walked through to the kitchen.
When her mum turned, her eyes went wide with a mixture of surprise and panic. She was dressed in a pastel-green and white embroidered Punjabi suit, with a lemon cardigan over the top. She shook her head, her short hair not moving. “Nagina? You’re here? My little girl on her birthday?” She stayed right where she was, lunch prepping on the hob, a wooden spoon in her hand. “Why didn’t you let us know you were coming? There are no phones in London anymore?” She put her spoon down. “I haven’t even got you a present!”
It wasn’t the first time Gina had heard that this weekend.
Her mum shook her head and turned her attention back to the hob.
Deepak walked in behind Gina, throwing a casual arm around her shoulders. It only went to accentuate the fact her mum hadn’t hugged her.
Gina swallowed down the emotion that was threatening to overtake her. She was not going to cry. Not on her birthday.
“Isn’t it amazing, Gina’s here!” Deepak walked over to the garage door that led off the kitchen and called through it. “Vijay get in here, your daughter’s here!”
Her dad peered around the door in seconds, confusion on his face. When his eyes landed on Gina, his face lit up. He held up his hands, covered in dust from his latest DIY project. “Nagina! My goodness! Let me wash my hands.” He disappeared back into the garage and they heard the water running in the garage sink. Moments later, her dad walked back in and came straight for Gina, giving her a big hug.
Gina breathed him in. He smelt of wood, and home.
“Why didn’t you tell us you were coming? We’d have invited everyone over.” He spun around, his grey hair short and newly cut. “Seema, have you called Kishan to come?”
Gina shook her head. “Dad, this is what I wanted to avoid. I don’t want a big thing. I’ve got a friend picking me up in a couple of hours. We’re here for a…” she couldn’t say the word Pride, could she? “…a work thing.” She hated herself for censoring. “I don’t have long. But I wanted to stop in and say hi.”
Her mum turned. “You only have a limited time for your family? This isn’t how we brought you up.” Her lips tightened. “And who is this friend? Is she your permanent friend or someone you just met?”
Deciphering the code was exhausting, and she’d only been in the door five minutes.
“She’s a friend. As in a friend, not a girlfriend.” Or at least, she was right now. After last night, Gina and India were standing on shifting sands. Now wasn’t the time to go into what they were and what they weren’t when Gina herself wasn’t even sure.
Her mum’s face hardened. She tried a smile, but it didn’t reach her eyes.
Maybe this wasn’t a good idea. But if Gina was in her home city, she should be able to call in on her family.
“She doesn’t want a present, she just wants a cup of chai. Right, Gina?” Deepak put a pan on the hob before she could answer, and grabbed the masala chai from the cannister on the counter.
Dad guided Gina to the wooden table she’d grown up with, shaking his head as he smiled at her. They’d knocked down the wall to the dining room since she left home, so the kitchen-diner was now open-plan, with patio doors leading out to the garden. “My little baby, all grown up. Forty-one today. What work are you doing up here? I would have thought your Hot London Properties were fairly London-based.”
He had a point. “It’s a charity project I’m doing on the side.”
“What charity?” He’d always been interested in what she was doing. It killed Gina to lie to him.
“You wouldn’t know it.” She paused. “But when we’ve had a drink, I do have a bit of a work thing I’d like to run by you. A business proposition.”
Her dad beamed. He ran a successful cash-and-carry firm in the city, working with her brother, Kishan, and her other uncle. Dad was a savvy business operator. He liked being looked on as such.
“But no business chat right now,” Deepak shouted, stirring the chai. “Seema, got any samosas? Or that loaf-cake with cherries you were making the other day? I know you have it somewhere!”
Her mum gave Deepak a look, but got the cherry loaf-cake out of the tin and put it in the middle of the dining table, along with some shortbread biscuits. Then she reheated some samosas in the microwave, while Deepak strained the chai into mugs and brought it over. At the table, unease settled on them like an ill-fitting sheet.
Gina glanced around the room at the familiar photos: her graduation, Neeta and Neil’s wedding, Kishan’s wedding and shots of his sons. On the sideboard, photos of her late grandparents were wreathed in dried flower garlands. From a shrine on the dining room wall opposite, Hindu god Lord Shiva eyeballed her.
Gina ate a lamb samosa amid the weighty silence. It was delicious. Then she cut some cake for something to do. If she had to eat her way through this visit, she was up to the challenge.
Deepak fiddled with his phone until her mum told him off for having it at the table. He rolled his eyes at Gina.
It was like old times. She could have hugged Deepak for being there. Left with just her parents, this would have been even more awkward. If that was possible.
“What business thing do you want to ask us?” Mum cut straight to the chase.
“After cake, Mum,” Gina said. “How’s Kishan and his tribe?”
“They’re all growing up just lovely. Three gorgeous boys.” Mum gave her a pointed stare. “Children make your life better, Nagina. They give it purpose.”
“If you want them,” Deepak cut in.
Gina threw him a grateful look. “Plus, my life has purpose. I work, I have friends, I do charity stuff. Purposeful.” She sent her mum’s look right back.
“This business proposition — you need money?”
Gina sighed. She wasn’t going to let it lie, was she? Gina may as well spit it out. “I do. I can go to the bank and ask for it there, but I wondered, since you invested in Kishan’s sideline, if you’d invest in mine. My business partner wants out, so I need to come up with the collateral. It’s a solid business and a good bet.” Unlike Kishan’s start-up, which was still faltering.
Mum pursed her lips again, then glanced at Dad. “It’s a tricky climate right now for investing.”
Gina wanted to scream “bullshit!”, but she didn’t. She was 41. She was beyond that. Even though she wanted to shake her mum.
“Dad?” She’d usually been able to appeal to his better nature.
He avoided her stare before he spoke. “We might be able to give you a bit, but I suspect you might need more than that.”
Gina closed her eyes. She shouldn’t have come, should she? She braced every muscle in her body for rejection. She’d steeled herself that this might happen, but now it was, she wasn’t prepared. She might think she was tough, but there were limits.
“Hold up.” Deepak put up a hand. “You were just telling me before she arrived how proud of Gina you are.”
“Deepak, you don’t have to do this, I’m a big girl.” Gina stared at her mug.
Deep breaths.
“It’s true!” Deepak replied. “They were saying that. Weren’t you?”
When Gina glanced up, her parents nodded.
“We are proud of her, of course. We’re proud of all our children,” Mum said.
“Especially Kishan, who didn’t move away and had children; Neeta and I both know.” Gina gripped her teaspoon tight. When she looked at her hand, it was shaking. “But you know what? It takes more effort to move away and not have children. To build your own life. To be your true self. It takes bravery to come out to your family and risk losing them.”
Her lip wobbled, and she breathed deep.
“It also takes time to come to terms with the fact that what you wanted for your daughter isn’t going to happen.” Her mum’s voice was low, but firm.
Her comment sat on the table in front of them, pulsing.
Gina glanced her way. “But this isn’t your life, Mum. It’s my life. And doing what makes you happy would make me miserable, don’t you see that?” She paused, then stood up. “You know what, this was a mistake. I’m going to call my friend and go.” Gina checked her watch. Had she really only been there for 20 minutes? It felt like a year. This was the stress she’d been trying to avoid in her life by not coming home. She’d been right all along.
Gina hoped India’s chat with Eunice had gone better.
Deepak stood up and took Gina’s arm. “Sit.” He paused. “Please.” He wasn’t letting go.
Gina stared at her parents, then at Deepak. Then she sat.
Deepak looked from her parents to her, then he sat, too. “Okay. This isn’t pretty.” He turned to her parents. “You should be more supportive of your daughter.”
“This is not your business—”
“It damn well is!” Deepak told her mum. “I’m not going to sit here and watch you crush Gina. She doesn’t deserve that. I agree with her. It took guts to tell you she’s gay. But so what? She’s still Gina. Life doesn’t revolve around you, Seema. If you want Gina to come home more, as you constantly tell me you do, you need to ease up. On Neeta, too. She doesn’t have kids yet. So what?” He sighed. “I know it’s not going to happen today, but think about it.”
Deepak turned to Gina. “And if you need money, you come to me. I want to help.”
Gina raised both eyebrows. She hadn’t even considered asking Deepak. “Are you serious?”
“Deadly.”
Gina lasted another hour before she messaged India to come and get her. Dad had tried to gloss over the altercation they’d had, while Mum had stayed silent. Gina thought her mum would get up and start cooking, like she always did. Instead, Mum got up, turned off the hob, then came and sat back down.
Gina didn’t know what to make of it. But they’d sat, eaten samosas and cake, drunk chai, and made small talk. Her uncle on her dad’s side in India had cancer. Her cousin in Yorkshire was pregnant (of course she was). Her granny had won a sewing competition. Kishan’s son was learning to swim. Nothing about Gina’s life, which was off limits as usual.
Then India knocked on the door.
Gina almost fell off her chair in her bid to get there first. When she opened it, she wanted to push India away, slot her into the car and drive off like none of the previous hour had ever happened. But she couldn’t do that. She knew it to be doubly true when she caught India staring over her shoulder. Gina turned to find her mum, dad and uncle all standing behind her, waiting to be introduced. So now, even if she wanted to smuggle India out of Birmingham, all routes were blocked.
Especially when she heard a whistle down the street. Gina peered around India to see Kishan heading towards the house, with all of his kids in tow, the youngest, Kiyan, in his arms.
India turned to look, too, then was almost bowled over by Gina’s oldest nephew, Aiden, pushing her aside and launching himself onto Deepak. Good to see her uncle hadn’t lost his touch.
“Hey, buddy!” Deepak juggled the wriggling seven-year-old in his arms. Seconds later, Aiden slapped his head, then broke free to hug his grandma. Deepak paid no attention. Instead, his eyes, like those of everyone else, were on India. “Aren’t you going to introduce us to your… guest?”
If Gina’s anxiety levels hadn’t been bursting out of her body, she might have laughed at Deepak’s struggle to pin a label on India. But now wasn’t the time for laughter. Not when she stood in her parents’ home, with her potential new girlfriend on their doorstep, and almost her entire immediate family focused on them both. If Gina had ever had a nightmare about her two worlds colliding, she wasn’t sure it could ever have matched up to this level of intensity.
“Everyone, this is India.” Gina gave India a look, but she wasn’t sure what she was trying to convey. It probably just came off as sheer terror. But India appeared to give her one back saying she understood. At least, that’s what Gina hoped it said.
“India, this is my family.” Gina waved a hand around the hallway. She knew it was sweeping, and not really to the point. But the thought of introducing India one by one and having her shake hands was a little too much.
“Dadi, have you got biscuits?” said her middle nephew, Devin, walking in the door. He was using the Punjabi term for ‘grandma’. He’d been trained well.
Gina had to smile. Perhaps having the kids here would take the pressure off just enough to make this bearable.
“In a minute, Devin,” her mum said. She hadn’t taken her eyes off India. “Your name is India?” Her clipped accent sounded even stronger when she said the land of her birth.
India nodded. “It is.” She stepped into the house, her height and perfume smothering the space. India’s beads clacked as she leaned forward and extended a hand. “Lovely to meet you, Mrs Gupta.”
Mum stared at India’s hand.
Gina held her breath.
Then her mum shook it.
India turned her radiant smile on Gina’s dad. “Mr Gupta.”
Dad shook India’s hand with more certainty.
Gina was impressed she was still standing. This was happening. This was not a drill. Her parents were actually meeting and shaking hands with India Contelli. Even if her mum still looked confused.
“Your actual first name is India? Like the country? Where we’re from?”
Gina closed her eyes. Why wouldn’t her mum just accept facts? It was a downfall of hers.
“Mum, I’m gay.”
“Nonsense, you’re just choosy when it comes to men.”
“Mum, this is India.”
“Like the country? Are you sure?”
But India dealt with it like a pro. “You’re not the first person to ask that, Mrs Gupta. But yes, I can assure you, it’s my real name. My parents are big fans of your homeland, so they named me after it.” India gave Mum a little shrug.
Mum conceded she was telling the truth by giving India a trace of a smile.
If Gina hadn’t seen it with her own eyes, she’d never have believed it.
It didn’t stop Gina feeling like this was the weirdest Sunday ever, though. Her body felt like somebody else’s, her mind completely shredded. She took a deep breath and gathered herself together in a bid to take back control. It hadn’t worked when it came to Brexit, but maybe it could work here.
“This is my Uncle Deepak,” Gina added to India.
Deepak wasted no time, pulling India into a stiff hug. India was not a hugger, whereas Deepak was the polar opposite.
When he let her go, India’s smile was more forced.
Gina would have to apologise later. “And on the doorstep is my brother Kishan and his many sons.”
Kishan stepped inside and shook India’s hand. “Pleasure. We don’t normally meet Gina’s friends. Having said that, we don’t normally see Gina.” He leaned down to kiss her. “Hello, big sis. Happy birthday.”
Gina gave him a knowing smile. “Thanks, little brother.”
“Now you’re here, you’ll stay for a cup of tea? We have English Breakfast tea, as well as chai. Plus delicious cake.” Deepak looked to India, then to Gina.
Gina shook her head. “Oh no, India has to get back, don’t you?” Gina hoped she’d take the hint.
But India was far too polite. She checked her watch. “Half an hour won’t hurt,” she said, fixing on her TV smile. “While I’m here, can I use your loo?”
Gina closed her eyes. She’d just entered truly uncharted territory.