Destination Wedding by Diksha Basu

Author:Diksha Basu
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2020-06-29T16:00:00+00:00

WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON

Lodhi Gardens, New Delhi: A Young Boy Is Sitting under the Shade of a Tree Going Through an Old Playboy He Bought in Daryaganj and Will Have to Throw Out Before Going Home

MR. DAS WAITED FOR MRS. Sethi near the India International Centre at the Lodhi Gardens entrance. It was a lovely afternoon, the dust and pollution adding a haze to the air that was quite romantic and diffused the afternoon sun. A fat street dog wearing a sweater lay lazily in the sun near the entrance, its tail swatting away flies every few seconds. Mr. Das was tempted to have a similar afternoon—something about India always made him want afternoon naps. It was a habit that started during the long summer afternoons in Calcutta when he was a little boy. He would come home from school and have lunch, usually rice and daal with steamed potatoes followed by a fish curry and dessert, always dessert. His father used to have a spoonful of sugar after every meal, even breakfast, if there wasn’t dessert at home. His father was a family doctor who had his clinic attached to the house so, on the one hand, his father was always around but, on the other hand, he was really never around and always at work. He had regular clinic hours from 10 A.M. until 7 P.M. and he reserved his evenings to do house calls and hold free clinic hours for poor people. Mr. Das used to resent those poor people lined up outside their gate with their illnesses and ailments that would keep his father in his clinic until long after he had gone to sleep. He never saw his father take time off. On most days, the servant, Karthik, would take a tray of food to the clinic for lunch and Mr. Das would look at the empty tray return an hour later. On occasion, his father came into the main house for lunch, his stethoscope hanging off his neck but he spent most of lunch on the phone diagnosing patients who were too old or too sick to come and see him. Once his father left or the empty tray returned, Mr. Das would take a bath and have a long afternoon nap before waking up to do his homework and play cricket with the neighboring children.

He thought of that as he waited for Mrs. Sethi. A young couple pulled up on a motorbike, the man with a helmet on, the woman sitting behind him sidesaddle in a salwar kameez with her dupatta draped around her hair and face to protect it from the pollution. She jumped off the back of the bike and untied the dupatta as the man put the bike into park and removed his helmet. He smiled at her and she turned away from his smile as if they were in the middle of a conversation. She went off a few steps ahead of him and he tossed his motorbike keys in the air, caught them, put them in his pocket, and rushed to catch up with her.

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