Codename lotus, p.9
Codename Lotus, page 9
Yet speaking of resurfacing, I thought back on my conversation with Naomi. It was true that Manish and I indeed shared a secretary.
The moment I shut the door behind me, I reached for my phone and scrolled through my contacts.
Nia picked up on the second ring.
“Mrs. Singh,” she greeted, formal as ever. “I wasn’t expecting your call.”
“Hello, Nia. Please forgive the late hour. I need you to look into something for me.” I paced the room. “When you worked for Manish, did he ever mention anything about passwords? Or codes? Something called a private key. Anything he might have written somewhere. I believe it’s a list.”
There was a pause on the other end.
“I...I don’t recall him ever writing anything down, no. If anything, he was the type to keep everything in his head. But he did have a habit of using the same passcodes across different platforms. Variations of them, at least.”
“Do you remember any?”
“I know his usual banking password had something to do with his university years and the number 12. I have them all in my admin book.”
I exhaled. That ridiculous superstition. But I already knew that password and we weren’t only looking for a single one. “Did he ever act strangely before he died? Anything unusual in the months leading up to it?”
Nia hesitated. “I...did notice he was more on edge than usual. A lot of private calls. He’d go silent whenever I entered the room.”
“Did you ever overhear anything? Any names?”
“No clear names or details. But he seemed...nervous.”
Nervous.
That was new.
Manish had been a lot of things—controlling, cruel, manipulative—but never nervous.
“I need you to go through his financial records,” I said. “Bank transactions, anything unusual. I want a report on all his movements in the months before he died. Could you do that for me?”
There was a beat of silence before she responded. “Of course. I can go through my records and see what I can find.”
“Good.” I hesitated. “And Nia—”
“Yes?”
“If you remember anything—anything at all—call me immediately.”
The morning after our impromptu dinner, I opened the kitchen cabinet to find an assortment of spices: garam masala, turmeric, cumin, Kashmiri chili powder, bright against the cabinet’s clean, white interior.
In the refrigerator, a colorful array of chilies, fresh curry leaves, and fresh coriander sat neatly next to Naomi’s grapefruits. Alongside were ripe, lustrous mangoes, dragon fruit, and plump lychees.
My mouth watered, and for the first time since discovering I was pregnant, it dawned on me that I was eating for two because I hated lychees, and it was all I wanted at the sight of them. But aside from that, it was as if the kitchen had been transformed to make a little more room for me.
It was an unexpected call from Rosie, Dr. Keller’s medical assistant, that shattered my morning, however.
“Good morning, Miss. Dr. Keller would like to see you today if possible. Your test results are in,” she informed me with a professional detachment that made me anxious.
“Is the baby all right?”
“We are not allowed to disclose any information over the phone.”
Well, Rosie was in dire need of some bedside manner. During my visit, I had found her devoid of basic civility, unlike the bubbly receptionist.
By the time the call ended, I was thoroughly stressed and worried.
And this was just the beginning, wasn’t it? I was now responsible for a whole other life that depended solely on me for their survival in this world.
Standing at Dr. Keller’s reception, Lea cheered me on. “Don’t worry, Miss Saanya, I’ve done this twice now. I’m practically a professional.”
I was grateful for the moral support, whichever way it came. After seeing my probably blanched face—which surely spoke volumes about my internal freak-out after that earlier call—Lea had offered to go with me. Lea was wonderful. Lea was kind.
And still, I couldn’t unsee Naomi intercepting us before we’d reached the door.
“Saanya?”
Frozen on the spot, I found it hard to watch Naomi say one simple—and dare I say, disappointed—“Oh” when I’d told her that Lea would be the one accompanying me to the clinic, with one of her bodyguards and chauffeur, of course.
Had Naomi wanted to come along? I wondered as the familiar face of Dr. Keller’s receptionist smiled at me expectantly.
“Pardon?” I said, having missed whatever she’d just said.
“I was just explaining that we only allow one person to come in with you for the appointment. Are we waiting for the other parent?” she asked, her pitch rising brightly.
“Um…sorry?”
“Your wife,” she said evenly.
“My—” I blinked hard. She turned her screen toward me.
Saanya Smith-Chopra.
The receptionist shuffled through a stack of papers and pulled out my check-in form from last week. Naomi’s unmistakable handwriting had left the medical history and personal details blank, filling in only the date, my phone number, and Smith-Chopra where my surname should have been, beneath the patient name and birth date. My heart ached. Her last name there instead of mine, legible for all to see, almost as if Naomi were staking a claim on me.
Call it retrograde, I certainly would otherwise, but I loved feeling hers.
“Miss?” This girl was thoughtful and kind. So unlike the one who’d called me.
“What’s your name again?” I asked.
“I’m Emma.” She smiled, and Lea went wide with excitement.
“Ah! So is my daughter!”
For a moment, I had forgotten about Lea being there.
I shook my head. “My friend helped me last time I was here. She must have made a mistake.” I was sure Naomi wasn’t one to fill out forms that contained personal information for anyone else but herself—perhaps she had a person who earned a paycheck only for that, but that day I had been rushed into the pre-check room without a chance to protest. “My name’s Saanya Singh,” I said, wishing I could shed his last name too—one day I would—but in every document containing my identity, I was still Mrs. Singh.
“Oh.” Her cheeks grew pink. “With the registration form and...seeing how you and Miss Smith-Chopra were acting toward each other the other day...I assumed.”
How we were acting toward each other. What?
The receptionist apologized and left with a smile, promising to be back as she went to rectify the error.
I heard a throat clearing right next to me. “I can see it,” Lea said—insinuating, really. “With respect.”
I laughed. “What?”
“You and Miss Naomi.” She lifted both hands. “I know, I know she’s engaged to be married. I know you told me you were married before, but…”
“But?”
“But the way you look at her, and just now, you should have seen your face.”
“Excuse me?”
Lea winced. “I could be wrong. My mother says I should learn to shut up.”
“It’s all right. You can be honest.”
“From what I can tell, it doesn’t seem like Miss Naomi has figured it out. Also…” She made a hissing sound. “I accidentally overheard you tell her you’re a lesbian the other night. I wasn’t prying, I promise.”
“How is that relevant to me fancying Naomi?”
“It’s not. But your eyes give you away. When she’s not looking, you…linger.”
My throat clicked as I swallowed. “I do?”
Lea pressed her lips and nodded sheepishly. “I’ll keep your secret. And if I may—hypothetically—you’d make a stunning pair. Yin and yang. And Miss Naomi’s so…so…”
Gorgeous? Regal? Knee-buckling attractive? But also obstinate, rigid, and emotionally unavailable?
“Such a CEO,” Lea finally said, with a bashful smile.
Well, that should encompass it all.
“And you are so utterly graceful, and gentle. So elegant.”
My younger self would be flat on the floor. Swooning.
So much for drama, though. Back at the house later that night, I still didn’t understand why they’d had me go into Dr. Keller’s office over a mild iron deficiency. Perhaps it had been the paperwork issue? My name next to Naomi’s.
Maybe that’s my life in a parallel universe.
Dreaming was free, but dreaming about Naomi was something I couldn’t afford.
And still, all afternoon, I couldn’t stop hearing Lea’s voice saying, “You linger.”
Dinner surprised me again. Naomi had orchestrated the menu, and by the time I had come downstairs, I was greeted with a set table and, as always, Naomi finishing a work call that had extended.
She had requested baked bluefin tuna with a citrus crust, quinoa, and a crunchy kale salad with an apricot and toasted almond vinaigrette. And still, underneath the gentrified dish, I had tasted the unmistakable kick of Kashmiri chili and cumin.
Naomi had purposefully catered to my taste. That wasn’t random, not after her previously bland dinners.
After, she asked me to join her for a glass of wine.
“You could have some tea, of course,” she’d said.
That should have been my cue to stop.
I should have listened to my gut. I didn’t that day with the jalebis.
But of course I didn’t listen.
She lounged on the shell-white, bespoke sofa, one arm draped over the cushion, shoulders pulled back.
But I had caught on to her preference by now. When Naomi wanted to unwind, she sat like this—one leg folded beneath her, shoes abandoned.
I mulled over the idea of bringing up our postponed conversation—the “rain check” we never got around to claiming. But was Naomi even a film person? Ninety-five percent of the time, she seemed so utterly focused that something as trivial as watching telly felt like an alien concept.
Before I could decide, Naomi summoned her music playlist with a simple command, and Sade started to play.
She sipped on her wine. “How did the doctor’s appointment go today?”
Oh, dear. I felt horror claiming my face and giving me away. Get yourself together.
I cleared my throat. “It went fine. Nothing major, really. She just had me return to fill out some paperwork I missed and prescribed me some iron pills.”
“Sounds simple enough.”
Wasn’t it just.
I felt the tickle of cynical laughter. Not because I found it funny that I was apparently pining over Naomi for the second time in my life, but because the timing seemed to mock me. How cruel of life to present this in my face when Naomi was engaged and straight.
Oh, Saanya, don’t you forget that she’s straight!
As if timing would change anything.
“What is it?” Naomi asked. “Did something happen at the doctor’s office?”
“Um…”
Saanya, keep it to yourself.
Naomi sipped her wine, and this time, licked her lower lip.
Oh my days. My sense of reason was holding its face in its hands.
Well, for the sake of times past…
“I, um…it went well, but there was this funny—or maybe not so funny incident. The receptionist assumed we were married.”
Her eyebrows rose. “You and I?” she asked wryly.
“Yeah, she...seemed quite convinced. I corrected her, of course.” I laughed nervously, trying to gauge Naomi’s reaction.
She seemed…amused? Her eyes still holding a glint of humor and mild intoxication from the wine. This was her third glass. “Well, that must have been quite a mix-up. I can’t imagine why she’d think that.”
I sighed and scratched my forehead. Whatever made me think Naomi would remember? She had probably been thinking about one of her deals or busy on the phone when she filled out my form. “It was nothing. Just a mix-up like you said. You wrote your last name on my form.”
“I did?”
“Yes. But it’s fine. I got it sorted.”
“Well, now that you mention it, I remember that god-awful nurse literally bullied me into filling out your medical history, or else you wouldn’t be seen. As if I’d let them turn you away over a formality. I should have had her fired. I was in the middle of an important business call.”
“Hey, at least you got my birthday right.” I smiled.
“How could I forget?”
For a moment, my heart lurched.
“It’s so close to Sid’s. I’ve committed it to memory.”
“Of course.” What else could it be? In hindsight, the absurdity almost felt funny. Everything seemed humorous in retrospect. Even these ridiculous feelings. “But you know, in a strange way, it felt…normal? Comforting, even. To be seen as just another couple amidst everything that’s going on in my life.”
To be linked to someone who doesn’t get a thrill out of hurting me and making me feel crazy. Someone I’d be head over heels over if she were indeed my wife.
Naomi leaned back, unfazed. Unbothered at being mistakenly linked to a lesbian relationship. But that was Naomi. Confidence unparalleled.
“Finding normalcy in chaos can be comforting,” she said. “It’s human instinct to seek stability.”
There was a beat.
“Though the idea of us as a couple is ludicrous.”
“Is it, though?”
Her glass paused. “I beg your pardon?”
I stared at the steady pool of creamy cardamom in my cup and then lifted my gaze. Right into Naomi’s green eyes that right now looked like a forest lake during morning hours. Clear, untouched. Bright and beautiful.
I stammered. “I-I used to really fancy you when we were teenagers.”
There. I’d said it. And it felt like half the weight of all those lies my life had been built upon slowly left me.
Naomi’s throat moved. But it wasn’t wine she had swallowed.
Shit.
As if making our living situation more awkward than it already was hadn’t been my worst idea yet. What made me think that Naomi would take this as a compliment?
“It seems silly now, looking back. And it was completely innocent.”
I lied, mostly. The innocent part was true. My feelings for Naomi hadn’t turned into something charged until I was in uni. Even then, there wasn’t a drop of silly in me when it came to her.
Still, I wasn’t a child anymore, and I was just so tired of hiding. Of explaining myself to others. Besides, the world had changed. Being a lesbian had never been more accepted as normal than today.
Naomi’s mind seemed to be working. She was perhaps processing the time-delayed bomb I had just dropped on her.
What are you thinking? Why are you looking at me that way?
“Really?” she finally said. “I had no idea. You always seemed so…composed around me.”
“I was good at pretending. Remember, I was hiding my sexual orientation from everyone. But yes, you were ‘the one’ to me back then,” I confessed.
Naomi let out a short, mirthless laugh.
“Strong, confident, and unapologetically yourself.” Warmth stung my eyes. “How you carried your hyphenated last names like a banner—proudly. Woven as if there were no other way to exist. And there wasn’t.”
I found Naomi’s gaze and held it. “You were inspiring.”
She sipped her glass again. “Well, that’s quite a revelation. I must say, it’s flattering, in a way,” she said, and I couldn’t hold her gaze anymore.
I focused on my hands for a second before meeting her eyes again.
“You know, I’ve always found it…challenging to connect with women,” she admitted, her voice carrying an unusual openness. “It’s not for lack of trying, but there’s always been a distance. My attempts at closer friendships with women have always fallen flat. Maybe it’s just me, or perhaps there’s something about me that doesn’t quite resonate with them.”
Who would have thought? The formidable Naomi grappling with insecurities and the nuances of personal relationships? I had always thought she simply didn’t like any of the girls in her class back then. Turned out she was just an insecure girl who felt awkward navigating the often rough waters of female circles.
“And as for…other types of relationships,” she continued, her gaze steady on me. “I’ve always been attracted to men. It’s who I am. It’s never been a question for me.”
It couldn’t be clearer, and still, the dagger cut deep. My stomach dropped as if little me was finally hearing the truth she had always dreaded.
Naomi reclined on the sofa, looking so relaxed given the intensity of our conversation that I pivoted.
Earlier, Lea told me how Naomi had approached her after the incident in the kitchen with the jalebis. Naomi didn’t apologize, per se—but from what Lea had mentioned, she’d done something more Naomi-like.
“I heard you lifted the ‘no kids around the house’ rule and allowed Helga’s grandchildren to come to the garden...even use that beautiful swing set that looks like it’s longing for children to play on it.”
“Someone might as well. It’s been sitting idle for too long.” Then she muttered under her breath, “That blasted swing set.”
I picked up on the subtle shift in her expression, though I didn’t understand why the swing set seemed to irritate her. Naomi had made it clear that she had no intention of becoming a mother, and if she hated the swing set so much, why keep it in the first place? I nodded toward it. “It’s so beautifully maintained. Did it come with the house when you bought it?”
She let out a half-hearted chuckle, her voice tinged with bittersweet irony. “Wouldn’t that have made it all easier?” she said it almost to herself. “No.” She sighed and scanned the ceiling. “I inherited this house.”
Naomi told me how, at nineteen, she had been given access to a small portion of her inheritance. Five hundred thousand dollars. Enough to cover her university studies in the States, a flat, and living expenses until she turned twenty-five and could take over her father’s company, Vertex Group, which her uncle had relocated to America—along with access to the rest of her one-hundred-and-eighty-million-dollar inheritance, including the Smith-Chopras’ house in Kensington, an estate in the Cotswolds, and this house.
The moment I shut the door behind me, I reached for my phone and scrolled through my contacts.
Nia picked up on the second ring.
“Mrs. Singh,” she greeted, formal as ever. “I wasn’t expecting your call.”
“Hello, Nia. Please forgive the late hour. I need you to look into something for me.” I paced the room. “When you worked for Manish, did he ever mention anything about passwords? Or codes? Something called a private key. Anything he might have written somewhere. I believe it’s a list.”
There was a pause on the other end.
“I...I don’t recall him ever writing anything down, no. If anything, he was the type to keep everything in his head. But he did have a habit of using the same passcodes across different platforms. Variations of them, at least.”
“Do you remember any?”
“I know his usual banking password had something to do with his university years and the number 12. I have them all in my admin book.”
I exhaled. That ridiculous superstition. But I already knew that password and we weren’t only looking for a single one. “Did he ever act strangely before he died? Anything unusual in the months leading up to it?”
Nia hesitated. “I...did notice he was more on edge than usual. A lot of private calls. He’d go silent whenever I entered the room.”
“Did you ever overhear anything? Any names?”
“No clear names or details. But he seemed...nervous.”
Nervous.
That was new.
Manish had been a lot of things—controlling, cruel, manipulative—but never nervous.
“I need you to go through his financial records,” I said. “Bank transactions, anything unusual. I want a report on all his movements in the months before he died. Could you do that for me?”
There was a beat of silence before she responded. “Of course. I can go through my records and see what I can find.”
“Good.” I hesitated. “And Nia—”
“Yes?”
“If you remember anything—anything at all—call me immediately.”
The morning after our impromptu dinner, I opened the kitchen cabinet to find an assortment of spices: garam masala, turmeric, cumin, Kashmiri chili powder, bright against the cabinet’s clean, white interior.
In the refrigerator, a colorful array of chilies, fresh curry leaves, and fresh coriander sat neatly next to Naomi’s grapefruits. Alongside were ripe, lustrous mangoes, dragon fruit, and plump lychees.
My mouth watered, and for the first time since discovering I was pregnant, it dawned on me that I was eating for two because I hated lychees, and it was all I wanted at the sight of them. But aside from that, it was as if the kitchen had been transformed to make a little more room for me.
It was an unexpected call from Rosie, Dr. Keller’s medical assistant, that shattered my morning, however.
“Good morning, Miss. Dr. Keller would like to see you today if possible. Your test results are in,” she informed me with a professional detachment that made me anxious.
“Is the baby all right?”
“We are not allowed to disclose any information over the phone.”
Well, Rosie was in dire need of some bedside manner. During my visit, I had found her devoid of basic civility, unlike the bubbly receptionist.
By the time the call ended, I was thoroughly stressed and worried.
And this was just the beginning, wasn’t it? I was now responsible for a whole other life that depended solely on me for their survival in this world.
Standing at Dr. Keller’s reception, Lea cheered me on. “Don’t worry, Miss Saanya, I’ve done this twice now. I’m practically a professional.”
I was grateful for the moral support, whichever way it came. After seeing my probably blanched face—which surely spoke volumes about my internal freak-out after that earlier call—Lea had offered to go with me. Lea was wonderful. Lea was kind.
And still, I couldn’t unsee Naomi intercepting us before we’d reached the door.
“Saanya?”
Frozen on the spot, I found it hard to watch Naomi say one simple—and dare I say, disappointed—“Oh” when I’d told her that Lea would be the one accompanying me to the clinic, with one of her bodyguards and chauffeur, of course.
Had Naomi wanted to come along? I wondered as the familiar face of Dr. Keller’s receptionist smiled at me expectantly.
“Pardon?” I said, having missed whatever she’d just said.
“I was just explaining that we only allow one person to come in with you for the appointment. Are we waiting for the other parent?” she asked, her pitch rising brightly.
“Um…sorry?”
“Your wife,” she said evenly.
“My—” I blinked hard. She turned her screen toward me.
Saanya Smith-Chopra.
The receptionist shuffled through a stack of papers and pulled out my check-in form from last week. Naomi’s unmistakable handwriting had left the medical history and personal details blank, filling in only the date, my phone number, and Smith-Chopra where my surname should have been, beneath the patient name and birth date. My heart ached. Her last name there instead of mine, legible for all to see, almost as if Naomi were staking a claim on me.
Call it retrograde, I certainly would otherwise, but I loved feeling hers.
“Miss?” This girl was thoughtful and kind. So unlike the one who’d called me.
“What’s your name again?” I asked.
“I’m Emma.” She smiled, and Lea went wide with excitement.
“Ah! So is my daughter!”
For a moment, I had forgotten about Lea being there.
I shook my head. “My friend helped me last time I was here. She must have made a mistake.” I was sure Naomi wasn’t one to fill out forms that contained personal information for anyone else but herself—perhaps she had a person who earned a paycheck only for that, but that day I had been rushed into the pre-check room without a chance to protest. “My name’s Saanya Singh,” I said, wishing I could shed his last name too—one day I would—but in every document containing my identity, I was still Mrs. Singh.
“Oh.” Her cheeks grew pink. “With the registration form and...seeing how you and Miss Smith-Chopra were acting toward each other the other day...I assumed.”
How we were acting toward each other. What?
The receptionist apologized and left with a smile, promising to be back as she went to rectify the error.
I heard a throat clearing right next to me. “I can see it,” Lea said—insinuating, really. “With respect.”
I laughed. “What?”
“You and Miss Naomi.” She lifted both hands. “I know, I know she’s engaged to be married. I know you told me you were married before, but…”
“But?”
“But the way you look at her, and just now, you should have seen your face.”
“Excuse me?”
Lea winced. “I could be wrong. My mother says I should learn to shut up.”
“It’s all right. You can be honest.”
“From what I can tell, it doesn’t seem like Miss Naomi has figured it out. Also…” She made a hissing sound. “I accidentally overheard you tell her you’re a lesbian the other night. I wasn’t prying, I promise.”
“How is that relevant to me fancying Naomi?”
“It’s not. But your eyes give you away. When she’s not looking, you…linger.”
My throat clicked as I swallowed. “I do?”
Lea pressed her lips and nodded sheepishly. “I’ll keep your secret. And if I may—hypothetically—you’d make a stunning pair. Yin and yang. And Miss Naomi’s so…so…”
Gorgeous? Regal? Knee-buckling attractive? But also obstinate, rigid, and emotionally unavailable?
“Such a CEO,” Lea finally said, with a bashful smile.
Well, that should encompass it all.
“And you are so utterly graceful, and gentle. So elegant.”
My younger self would be flat on the floor. Swooning.
So much for drama, though. Back at the house later that night, I still didn’t understand why they’d had me go into Dr. Keller’s office over a mild iron deficiency. Perhaps it had been the paperwork issue? My name next to Naomi’s.
Maybe that’s my life in a parallel universe.
Dreaming was free, but dreaming about Naomi was something I couldn’t afford.
And still, all afternoon, I couldn’t stop hearing Lea’s voice saying, “You linger.”
Dinner surprised me again. Naomi had orchestrated the menu, and by the time I had come downstairs, I was greeted with a set table and, as always, Naomi finishing a work call that had extended.
She had requested baked bluefin tuna with a citrus crust, quinoa, and a crunchy kale salad with an apricot and toasted almond vinaigrette. And still, underneath the gentrified dish, I had tasted the unmistakable kick of Kashmiri chili and cumin.
Naomi had purposefully catered to my taste. That wasn’t random, not after her previously bland dinners.
After, she asked me to join her for a glass of wine.
“You could have some tea, of course,” she’d said.
That should have been my cue to stop.
I should have listened to my gut. I didn’t that day with the jalebis.
But of course I didn’t listen.
She lounged on the shell-white, bespoke sofa, one arm draped over the cushion, shoulders pulled back.
But I had caught on to her preference by now. When Naomi wanted to unwind, she sat like this—one leg folded beneath her, shoes abandoned.
I mulled over the idea of bringing up our postponed conversation—the “rain check” we never got around to claiming. But was Naomi even a film person? Ninety-five percent of the time, she seemed so utterly focused that something as trivial as watching telly felt like an alien concept.
Before I could decide, Naomi summoned her music playlist with a simple command, and Sade started to play.
She sipped on her wine. “How did the doctor’s appointment go today?”
Oh, dear. I felt horror claiming my face and giving me away. Get yourself together.
I cleared my throat. “It went fine. Nothing major, really. She just had me return to fill out some paperwork I missed and prescribed me some iron pills.”
“Sounds simple enough.”
Wasn’t it just.
I felt the tickle of cynical laughter. Not because I found it funny that I was apparently pining over Naomi for the second time in my life, but because the timing seemed to mock me. How cruel of life to present this in my face when Naomi was engaged and straight.
Oh, Saanya, don’t you forget that she’s straight!
As if timing would change anything.
“What is it?” Naomi asked. “Did something happen at the doctor’s office?”
“Um…”
Saanya, keep it to yourself.
Naomi sipped her wine, and this time, licked her lower lip.
Oh my days. My sense of reason was holding its face in its hands.
Well, for the sake of times past…
“I, um…it went well, but there was this funny—or maybe not so funny incident. The receptionist assumed we were married.”
Her eyebrows rose. “You and I?” she asked wryly.
“Yeah, she...seemed quite convinced. I corrected her, of course.” I laughed nervously, trying to gauge Naomi’s reaction.
She seemed…amused? Her eyes still holding a glint of humor and mild intoxication from the wine. This was her third glass. “Well, that must have been quite a mix-up. I can’t imagine why she’d think that.”
I sighed and scratched my forehead. Whatever made me think Naomi would remember? She had probably been thinking about one of her deals or busy on the phone when she filled out my form. “It was nothing. Just a mix-up like you said. You wrote your last name on my form.”
“I did?”
“Yes. But it’s fine. I got it sorted.”
“Well, now that you mention it, I remember that god-awful nurse literally bullied me into filling out your medical history, or else you wouldn’t be seen. As if I’d let them turn you away over a formality. I should have had her fired. I was in the middle of an important business call.”
“Hey, at least you got my birthday right.” I smiled.
“How could I forget?”
For a moment, my heart lurched.
“It’s so close to Sid’s. I’ve committed it to memory.”
“Of course.” What else could it be? In hindsight, the absurdity almost felt funny. Everything seemed humorous in retrospect. Even these ridiculous feelings. “But you know, in a strange way, it felt…normal? Comforting, even. To be seen as just another couple amidst everything that’s going on in my life.”
To be linked to someone who doesn’t get a thrill out of hurting me and making me feel crazy. Someone I’d be head over heels over if she were indeed my wife.
Naomi leaned back, unfazed. Unbothered at being mistakenly linked to a lesbian relationship. But that was Naomi. Confidence unparalleled.
“Finding normalcy in chaos can be comforting,” she said. “It’s human instinct to seek stability.”
There was a beat.
“Though the idea of us as a couple is ludicrous.”
“Is it, though?”
Her glass paused. “I beg your pardon?”
I stared at the steady pool of creamy cardamom in my cup and then lifted my gaze. Right into Naomi’s green eyes that right now looked like a forest lake during morning hours. Clear, untouched. Bright and beautiful.
I stammered. “I-I used to really fancy you when we were teenagers.”
There. I’d said it. And it felt like half the weight of all those lies my life had been built upon slowly left me.
Naomi’s throat moved. But it wasn’t wine she had swallowed.
Shit.
As if making our living situation more awkward than it already was hadn’t been my worst idea yet. What made me think that Naomi would take this as a compliment?
“It seems silly now, looking back. And it was completely innocent.”
I lied, mostly. The innocent part was true. My feelings for Naomi hadn’t turned into something charged until I was in uni. Even then, there wasn’t a drop of silly in me when it came to her.
Still, I wasn’t a child anymore, and I was just so tired of hiding. Of explaining myself to others. Besides, the world had changed. Being a lesbian had never been more accepted as normal than today.
Naomi’s mind seemed to be working. She was perhaps processing the time-delayed bomb I had just dropped on her.
What are you thinking? Why are you looking at me that way?
“Really?” she finally said. “I had no idea. You always seemed so…composed around me.”
“I was good at pretending. Remember, I was hiding my sexual orientation from everyone. But yes, you were ‘the one’ to me back then,” I confessed.
Naomi let out a short, mirthless laugh.
“Strong, confident, and unapologetically yourself.” Warmth stung my eyes. “How you carried your hyphenated last names like a banner—proudly. Woven as if there were no other way to exist. And there wasn’t.”
I found Naomi’s gaze and held it. “You were inspiring.”
She sipped her glass again. “Well, that’s quite a revelation. I must say, it’s flattering, in a way,” she said, and I couldn’t hold her gaze anymore.
I focused on my hands for a second before meeting her eyes again.
“You know, I’ve always found it…challenging to connect with women,” she admitted, her voice carrying an unusual openness. “It’s not for lack of trying, but there’s always been a distance. My attempts at closer friendships with women have always fallen flat. Maybe it’s just me, or perhaps there’s something about me that doesn’t quite resonate with them.”
Who would have thought? The formidable Naomi grappling with insecurities and the nuances of personal relationships? I had always thought she simply didn’t like any of the girls in her class back then. Turned out she was just an insecure girl who felt awkward navigating the often rough waters of female circles.
“And as for…other types of relationships,” she continued, her gaze steady on me. “I’ve always been attracted to men. It’s who I am. It’s never been a question for me.”
It couldn’t be clearer, and still, the dagger cut deep. My stomach dropped as if little me was finally hearing the truth she had always dreaded.
Naomi reclined on the sofa, looking so relaxed given the intensity of our conversation that I pivoted.
Earlier, Lea told me how Naomi had approached her after the incident in the kitchen with the jalebis. Naomi didn’t apologize, per se—but from what Lea had mentioned, she’d done something more Naomi-like.
“I heard you lifted the ‘no kids around the house’ rule and allowed Helga’s grandchildren to come to the garden...even use that beautiful swing set that looks like it’s longing for children to play on it.”
“Someone might as well. It’s been sitting idle for too long.” Then she muttered under her breath, “That blasted swing set.”
I picked up on the subtle shift in her expression, though I didn’t understand why the swing set seemed to irritate her. Naomi had made it clear that she had no intention of becoming a mother, and if she hated the swing set so much, why keep it in the first place? I nodded toward it. “It’s so beautifully maintained. Did it come with the house when you bought it?”
She let out a half-hearted chuckle, her voice tinged with bittersweet irony. “Wouldn’t that have made it all easier?” she said it almost to herself. “No.” She sighed and scanned the ceiling. “I inherited this house.”
Naomi told me how, at nineteen, she had been given access to a small portion of her inheritance. Five hundred thousand dollars. Enough to cover her university studies in the States, a flat, and living expenses until she turned twenty-five and could take over her father’s company, Vertex Group, which her uncle had relocated to America—along with access to the rest of her one-hundred-and-eighty-million-dollar inheritance, including the Smith-Chopras’ house in Kensington, an estate in the Cotswolds, and this house.
