Lowball

Ties That Bind
Part Four

“Kavitha! I need to talk to you!” Minal was hollering down the hall, giving Michael a headache. This was not a great way to start the day. He stumbled out of bed, to hear Kavitha shouting back, “After rehearsal!” and disappearing out the door. God. She’d spent almost the entire day yesterday at the studio, and now she was gone so early? It wasn’t even six A.M. yet. He wasn’t even sure they turned on the AC in her building at this hour of the morning.

“Michael, I know you don’t like dealing with money, but we have to talk about this,” Minal said, walking up to him, frowning, hands balled on her hips. Finances always gave him a headache-maybe the residue of all those years of hearing his parents worry about money, about whether the laundromat would make enough to see it through another month. It had been such a relief when Minal, capable Minal, had taken over the family finances. “She spent way more than her discretionary budget allows for yesterday.”

“Minal, that’s not my problem. Take it up with Kavitha.” Michael was relieved that it really wasn’t his problem. He had enough to worry about. He was going to go back and re-check the docks for Sandip on his lunch break today; he’d thought of a few more places worth looking at.

Minal thumped him gently on the arm. “I tried to talk to her! You saw-she just ran away from me.”

Maya Aunty came out of Isai’s bedroom, the child rubbing sleepy eyes and holding her grandmother’s hand. “What is the problem? Why all the shouting? I would be happy to give you children some money.”

“No, no, Aunty,” Minal said hastily. “We have plenty. It’s just important to stick to a budget, you know? Kavitha has always had trouble with that, but we’ve been working on it-I thought we finally had an agreement. She was being so good, but now-”

“It’s a difficult time,” Maya Aunty said quietly. Isai let go of her hand and climbed up into Michael’s arms for a good morning hug. He buried his face in her unruly hair and took a moment to enjoy the fierce embrace of his daughter. This part, he loved.

Minal sighed. “I know. She probably bought herself some new clothes to cheer herself up. Although I haven’t noticed any shopping bags.”

Isai slid down impatiently and went to give Minal the same monster hug treatment. Michael said, “Maybe she was embarrassed. She might have left them at the studio.” It was sort of charming, actually-he could imagine Kavitha there, surreptitiously trying on clothes in front of the big glass mirrors. Something red and slinky would look so great on her, although that wasn’t really her style. Maybe when all this was over, he would buy her something she could wear out to dinner, with his ring on her finger. He was pretty sure Minal already had plenty of slinky red dresses. Although it might be the better part of wisdom to get her a present too. A man didn’t survive this long with two girlfriends without learning a few things.

Minal sighed in reluctant agreement. “I suppose we can talk about this later. C’mon, sweetie.” She settled Isai more comfortably on her hip. “Time for morning potty and teeth brushing.”

Morning potty was another thing Michael was happy to leave to Minal, along with the financial headaches. Right now, all he wanted was coffee. “Coffee, Aunty?” That, he could take care of.

Yesterday, Kavitha’s mother had finally explicitly told Michael to call her Maya Aunty. It was a huge concession, and won only after her husband had decamped. He had tried to persuade her to come too, saying, “What is the point, kunju? The boy will come home when he wants to come home-it’s not up to us.”

She had responded, “You! You are the one who drove him away! Go, go now. I will stay, and make sure that he comes home.”

And so Maya had stayed, moving into Isai’s bedroom, giving them back their living room. A bit of breathing space, and even some grandmotherly babysitting-whatever her prejudices, Maya had been completely won over by her grandchild. And Isai, for her part, adored her new grandmother. It was endearing, if bizarre, to see the old woman crooning over her grandchild, singing old lullabies in Tamil while preening the girl’s shape-shifted feathers.

So things were relatively quiet at home, and quieter at work too-no new snatches. There were reports of similar incidents overseas, but nothing in America recently. Yesterday, he’d found the final link in his smuggling case; it was all over, except for the paperwork. Michael was going to keep looking for Sandip, of course, but he was still hoping Sandip would find his own way home soon. Michael was almost ready to relax-until he was ambushed in his own home.

Maya dug into her dressing gown pocket. “I do not want coffee. I want to know, what is this?” she hissed, holding up a little red box, practically shoving it into Michael’s nose.

“Where did you find that?” Michael whispered, with a glance down the hall, to where Minal was in the bathroom with Isai. The door was closed; she shouldn’t hear anything, as long as he finished this quickly. Follow a question with a question, that’s what he’d been taught-keep them on the defensive. Easy to say, hard to do, especially when your heart is racing.

“I wanted to wash your jackets and coats yesterday; winter is coming.”

Not for months! “You don’t need to do that, Aunty,” Michael said, automatically.

She frowned. “If I don’t, who will? At least that girl”-she always referred to Minal as that girl-“can cook, but none of you clean properly. You live in filth.”

Michael was glad neither of the women were around to hear that-Minal would probably shrug and move on, but Kavitha would be hurt. She was just beginning to mend her relationship with her mother, but it was a fragile peace-she wasn’t up to taking much in the way of criticism yet. Michael had had enough of conflict in the last month to last him a lifetime.

Yet here Maya came with more. “So what does this mean?” She flipped the box open, letting the two rings sparkle. One was a vintage ring, lots of tiny little diamonds in an intricate setting, for Kavitha, who loved old things. And the other was a single large-ish diamond, flanked by two tiny rubies-that one was for Minal; he’d thought she’d appreciate a flashy rock to show her old street friends. Neither ring was terribly expensive, but the best he could afford on a detective’s salary.

“It should be obvious, I think,” Michael said, striving for calm.

“For both of them?”

Quiet certainty, that was the tone to use. He needed to sound sure of himself, even if he wasn’t. Maya would leap on weakness like a shark on its prey. “Yes.”

She raised a diminutive eyebrow. “So what are you waiting for?”

“What?” He felt as if she’d just punched him with that tiny little hand.

“How long have these been sitting in your pocket?”

“Umm … a while?” Had it really been less than a month since Sally had gotten that promotion? The weeks with Black as his putative partner seemed endless.

Maya snapped, “A while? Do you know how far we could have gotten in planning the wedding in a while?”

Michael frowned, bewildered. “You mean-you’re happy about this? You wouldn’t mind if your daughter married a man who was also marrying someone else?” This was not the reaction he’d expected.

Maya frowned right back, and stepped even closer to him. He wanted to step back, but he was enough of a cop to stand his ground. He wasn’t going to be pushed around by a little old lady, even if she was his almost-mother-in-law. Maya said, “It’s not the marriage I would have chosen for her. But the important thing is that she get married. She is so old.”

Michael winced. Another thing Kavitha didn’t need to hear.

Maya continued, “Besides, the marriage is your affair. The wedding is mine. I will have to hurry if we want to reserve elephants for next summer. We cannot get them any earlier, I am quite sure.”

“Elephants?” Michael felt as if she’d added a set of brass knuckles to the fist she was punching into his gut. Metaphorically.

She sighed. “Well, of course, elephants. In the old days, we would have had to go back to Sri Lanka for a proper wedding, but now, things are advanced. You can get anything you need here. The elephants, thali necklace, saris, saffron and jasmine, a priest willing to perform mixed marriages…”

“There isn’t going to be a Hindu priest,” Michael protested. His parents would freak out if the wedding wasn’t Catholic. God, he hadn’t even thought of that. But Maya just flipped her hands in his face.

“Details, details. You let me worry about that. Me and your mother-we’ll sort it out. Don’t worry about the money-we have plenty saved up. I was going to spend it on a luxury cruise, since I didn’t think the girl would ever get married, but cruises can wait.”

“Aunty-”

She stopped him, with a raised hand in front of his face. “Michael. Do you love them? Both of them?”

It was so strange-the last few weeks had been so crazy, there hadn’t been any time for fun, or romance, or even sex. And he still couldn’t really imagine the life to come, when he was married to two women, until death did them part. He was pretty sure that wasn’t a wise choice for an ambitious man who wanted to go far with his career. But when she asked the question, Michael was surprised to find that none of that mattered. Because the answer was easy, it just slipped right out, grounded in a bone-deep certainty. “Yes.”

Minal with her cooking and sexiness and the practical competence that got the four of them through their days; Kavitha with her beauty and grace, her passion for family and commitment to lofty ideals. Michael loved them both to death, so much that it was easier not to think about it. He wasn’t sure a man should love a woman, especially two women, so much.

“So ask her, kunju,” Maya said, her tone suddenly gentled. “Ask them both. Life is short, and unpredictable. You must take happiness where you can. If the past few weeks have taught me nothing else, they have taught me that.” Her eyes were bright, but her voice was steady.

“I’m sure Sandip will turn up,” Michael offered weakly. He wasn’t sure of any such thing.

Maya just pushed the ring box into his hand, shook her head in that strange South Asian gesture that meant yes-no-and it’s in the hands of the gods all at once, and turned away, her shoulders erect and unwavering.

God. Michael swore, if he had a dozen like her on the force, he’d clean up this dirty city in a month.

Just ask them. Okay. What the hell had he been waiting for?

Michael had thought about how to do it. He couldn’t ask one of them first, and then the other-that would be too strange, and might lead to problems. It had to be both at once, and the only time he had alone with them both was at night, once Isai and Maya had gone to bed. But he’d also eventually realized that he couldn’t ask them in bed-it would be too weird. Like saying “I love you” right after an orgasm-no one could take it seriously. So not in bed, but after Maya and Isai were asleep. Which meant during dishes, which they usually did at the very end of the day, after picking up the disaster of scattered toys. It wasn’t the most romantic time ever, but it was the best he could do.

Usually Michael washed, Minal dried, and Kavitha put away. It was fast and efficient, but tonight Michael left Kavitha to wash the dishes and disappeared into the front hall. The box was waiting in his jacket pocket, the rings still safe inside. He took it in a hand that was suddenly shaking-it was funny; he’d faced down more than his share of bad guys, some of them with guns, some of them twisted by their wild cards into something scarier than a gun. Yet here he was, the big bad black cop, shaking.

Michael took a deep breath, steadied his hand, and then turned and walked back down the hall, into the kitchen. He’d left the room with everything calm; he came back in to find the women bent over the sink, snapping at each other in lowered voices, clearly angry, but also careful not to wake Kavitha’s mother or the child.

“Are you serious?” Kavitha asked, her hands still furiously washing dishes. “You’re going to abandon me now? We still have no idea where Sandip is.” Her voice was sharper, more shrill, than Michael had ever heard it. He felt a pang of guilt that he wasn’t looking harder for her brother. Although he had his doubts that the kid was even still in New York. Maybe he’d managed to cross the border, go back to Toronto, to hang with his friends. Wasn’t that the sort of thing teenagers did?

Minal took a plate from her and rubbed it dry. “I’m not trying to abandon you. Gods, I know you’re a performer, but do you have to be such a drama queen? Don’t you think it would be easier, if I weren’t here? Spring semester will be over in two more days-I can take the summer off, head out of town for a month or two. It won’t be so crowded here; you won’t be tripping over each other.”

Kavitha said flatly, “You just don’t want to deal with my mother anymore.”

Minal sighed. “Look, I won’t claim it’s easy talking to her, especially when she so carefully avoids discussing our relationship. But it’s not that. She’s actually kind of sweet, in her own way. I just don’t want to make her life harder right now.”

“You think I do?” Kavitha’s hands stilled in the soapy water of the sink.

“Oh, God. That’s not what I was saying! Michael, will you tell her, please? Can you explain what I meant?” Minal turned to him, finally seeing the box in his outstretched hand. “Oh, shit.”

Kavitha turned too, her open mouth abruptly closing. He didn’t want to know what she’d been about to say. He didn’t know what he ought to say. This wasn’t how he’d pictured this going.

Well, he wasn’t going to put the box away, not now. He popped it open, so the rings were visible, and slightly awkwardly slid to one knee in front of them. “Umm … I love you. I love you both. Will you marry me?”

Minal looked at Kavitha, then back at him. “You idiot. Your timing sucks. But yes, of course. Yes.” She grinned widely, and reached a joyful hand out to Kavitha. “Sweetheart? Marry us?”

Kavitha swallowed, and took a step back, pressing up against the porcelain sink. It seemed like an endless awful time before she said, “I’m so sorry. I can’t. No.”