“Chapter thirty for next time. And don’t forget there’s a screening of Meet the Patels tonight at the Cantor Film Center,” the professor calls as my fellow students and I gather our notebooks and backpacks.
I loop a green silk scarf around my neck and lift my bag onto my shoulder.
“Are you walking back to the dorm?” Rajiv, another film major in my class, asks in a British accent so lovely and warm it could star in its own rom-com.
“Actually, errands. Also I’m headed to the campus store to get my parents some school gear before I head home for Thanksgiving.”
“Ahh, yes. The American holiday celebrating colonialism with a bland, dry bird.” He grins at me as we walk out of the building together. Rajiv lifts the collar of his jacket to block the wind.
“And the British are such strangers to colonialism and bland food?”
“I can at least take up the food issue with the queen.”
“Yes, please do.” I nudge Rajiv as we reach the corner.
“So are you thinking of going to the film this evening?”
“Planning on it.”
“Would you like to attend … with me, perhaps? Together?”
I look at the curly-haired young man in front of me, sporting the exact right amount of stubble and charm. “A documentary about desi matchmaking with a desi. That’s not awkward at all.” I grin at him and nod.
“Well, I’m Hindu, and you’re Muslim; obviously we’re star-crossed. I’ll pick you up at your dorm tonight, say seven? We can grab falafel at Mamoun’s first.”
“Perfect. See you.” I’m smiling wide, like the American I am, showing off every tooth.
“Cheers,” he says, then gives me a quick kiss on the cheek before heading off.
I suck in my breath. It was just a peck, but no one’s kissed me since Phil and I said goodbye. Though it wasn’t a goodbye, exactly, since we refused to say that word. I’m still not quite sure what it was. The greatest “see-you-later” kiss of all time?
We’d just gone for our last swim at the pond, the summer sun warm through the canopy of leaves. Unlike before, it dried our wet bodies as we walked back to the cabin, silently, hand in hand. We didn’t go in.
Phil gently drew me into his arms and bent down to kiss me. I was crying before I knew it. I pulled away to wipe tears from my cheeks, but he took my face in his hands, smiled and said, “We’ll always have the pond.”
I laughed. “You actually watched Casablanca? I thought you said you hated sappy, black-and-white movies.”
“Casablanca? Nah. That was a reference to an old Star Trek: Next Generation episode I saw with my dad.”
I laughed through my tears. I kissed him again, then turned to go. I wanted to leave first. I didn’t think I could bear to watch him walk away from me. But I glanced over my shoulder and saw him there, face lit by the afternoon. “Here’s looking at you, kid,” he called.
He was smiling, but his cheeks glistened with tears, too. He knew what I knew: there was no tomorrow for us if we were going our own ways, to different places and different futures.
That was the moment. Our final scene, unadorned.
The fleeting warmth of Rajiv’s lips on my skin brought it all rushing back—Phil’s touch, his lips, his fingertips and a feeling that is not so fleeting after all. My body remembers what part of my mind wants to forget—because there are times when I struggle to reconcile what I gave up to be here, in this very moment, despite how much I wanted it. How much I do want it. The past may be prologue, but it’s with me, every day.
I walk through Washington Square Park, pausing to watch a group of young acrobats perform for tourist tips. The wind kicks up, whirling leaves into little whirlpools. I shiver. The days are growing shorter.
I wonder how my parents will react to the NYU swag. We’ve agreed to a family Thanksgiving at Hina’s house. It was all Hina’s idea. She even bought me the ticket home. I was reluctant, but I owe her. More than I can ever repay. I’m hoping it’s a good sign that my parents are coming. I guess I sort of owe them this, too. My mom even texted me asking if I wanted her to bring my favorite winter hat to Hina’s so I would have it for school. It’s not my favorite. It’s this bubblegum-pink knit beanie with a white pom-pom on top that she bought me three years ago. But her text broke my heart a little. So I replied with a shouty caps:
YES! PLEASE! ❆ ❤
I’m sure that made her happy.
I know now that I can never really understand how much I hurt them or how bewildered they must’ve been when I left, pondering what they’d done to deserve what they see as a betrayal.
The fact is they didn’t do anything wrong. I see that now. They are my parents. I am their daughter. And the world between us cracked because of the difference in how we understand that fundamental bond. But if my mom can extend a peace offering, so can I.
Even with uncertainties at home, I’m excited to go back, trade stories with Violet in person. And see Phil, whatever we may be to each other.
There’s time before the movie, and I possess a strong desire to put off my errands and homework, so I set off on a long walk through the city—a habit that’s quickly become a favorite pastime since I arrived in New York, my camera always at the ready.
Today, I walk up West Fourth Street, then turn onto West Tenth and head for the river. West Fourth is one of those odd streets that break the New York grid, at least my newbie understanding of it, where streets normally run east-west and avenues north-south. Except in New York parlance where “north” and “south” are “uptown” and “downtown.” And then there’s the funny way you give an address, always with the cross streets. Like everything else in New York, geography has its own culture.
I head west on Tenth Street, passing trendy boutiques with only a dozen clothes displayed on the racks, a tea shop, a French café, a vintage store, a very expensive florist, bars opening for the afternoon, Federal-style townhouses with grand doors, ivy-covered brownstones, even an apothecary shop. I walk under the barren branches of trees and wonder about the generations of starving artists and writers who once pounded this same pavement, but had to flee when rents rose and heftier pocketbooks moved in. From time to time, I raise my fingers to the silver ginkgo leaf pendant Phil gave me as a goodbye gift. I wear it every day. As a reminder. As a talisman.
Right before Tenth Street emerges onto the cacophony of the West Side Highway, I stop to get a latte, wrapping my cool hands around the cup for warmth. As soon as I cross into Hudson River Park, the traffic din dies down, giving way to the sloshing of waves against the piers that jut out into the river. I love the unruly water that gives the Hudson its personality. On chilly afternoons, the park is mostly quiet, except for a few bicyclists and people walking their dogs. As I stroll far out onto the pier, I savor the sweetness of having a corner of New York all to myself.
At the end of the wide dock, I gaze down the open river corridor to the Statue of Liberty far in the distance, beyond the pile field of submerged logs that once supported the old piers. I breathe in the salty air—thinking of the first deep breath thousands of immigrants once took as they sailed into New York Harbor, dreaming. Even my own parents, though they arrived by plane from India, first stepped foot on American soil in New York. They stayed with family friends in Queens for a week before their onward journey to the Midwest. An old framed photo on my mother’s bureau pops into my mind: my parents standing on a tour boat against white rails, close but not touching. The Statue of Liberty in the background. My mother is graceful and thin with a sari draped over one shoulder and pulled modestly like a shawl around her back. My father, bushy-haired and smiling, squints in the sun. The hopes and ambitions they must’ve had, newly married and in love. How impossible it would’ve been for those two young people to envision where their lives would lead them. I want to walk into the picture, take their hands, and say that there will be incredible and heartbreaking changes ahead, but that their lives here will be good.
The wind chaps my cheeks. I glance down at my watch and start toward my dorm. At the next corner, I pause, setting up a crane shot for the movie in my mind:
The sky darkens as people brush by The Girl. Her green scarf flutters on the screen as the overcranked motion eventually slows around her. She turns to smile at the camera overhead, the vibrant resonance of New York swelling, as the edges of the frame fade to black.