When Dimple Met Rishi
Page 21

She saw Rishi suppressing a smile and said, “Sorry. Too many questions.” She jabbed at the elevator button, knowing she should feel embarrassed. But somehow, strangely, with Rishi, she didn’t.
“Not at all.” It sounded like he meant it. Leaning against the wall, he crossed his arms and said, “My brother, Ashish, is sixteen. You couldn’t find two blood relatives more different than we are. Sometimes I think Ashish wishes he’d been born into another family. He’s like a different species than the rest of us.”
Dimple pulled a face. “Ashish and I would probably have a lot in common, then.”
The elevator doors dinged open and a few girls got out, talking animatedly about some poetry reading they were going to for their summer literature program. Rishi and Dimple were the only ones going up.
As the doors slid closed, enveloping them in solitude in that tiny metal chamber, Dimple’s mind somehow kept reverting back to that moment in the antiques store. When she’d tried to take the camera and they’d ended up so close together. The way the air had shifted.
She tried to think about more important things, like the upcoming Insomnia Con prep they had to do in the morning, but her mind stubbornly kept interjecting that scene, playing over and over the memory of her pulse quickening, the way Rishi’s smile had slowly faded. . . .
• • •
He watched her surreptitiously. She was lost in thought, and the emotions on her face were sort of amusing. There was something dreamy, and then a flash of irritation, and then more dreaminess before irritation erased it again. His lips twitched; he wondered what she was thinking about.
Rishi cleared his throat. “Hey, it’s, uh, only nine thirty. We could work on a little bit of the prep if you want. Or, you know, do it tomorrow morning too, if you have other stuff going on.” He didn’t want this night to be over. Which was ridiculous, because he was sure there were about a thousand other nights they could both name that would probably have ranked much higher than this one, thanks to the Aberzombies.
Dimple glanced at him, her lips parting a bit, like he’d caught her out at something. Now he really wanted to know what she’d been thinking. “Um, no, yeah. That sounds good. I’m just going to go take a shower and change into some comfier clothes. I can meet you at your room, if you want. I’m not sure I’m ready to face Celia when she gets home.”
He grinned, his heart singing that she’d said yes. To a study session , Patel, he reminded himself. To her, he said, “Yeah, that’s cool. I imagine I’m not her favorite person right now anyway, so she probably wouldn’t be too thrilled to see me in your room.”
The doors pinged open on the fourth floor. Stepping out, he put one hand against the slot so they wouldn’t close. “So, say ten fifteenish?”
She nodded and smiled. “Works for me.”
And Rishi, gods help him, thought, I could look at that smile every day and never get tired of it.
CHAPTER 18
Back in her room, Dimple loaded up her shower caddy and took a quicker shower than she strictly wanted to. She didn’t want to be there when Celia got back. She hadn’t fully processed all that had happened at Elm, and she needed some time to do that. When Celia asked her why she and Rishi had been so hostile to her friends, she wanted to have a proper response. Dimple was excellent at arguing with Mamma, but when it came to confrontations with other people, her backbone somehow became jellylike. One way to fix it, she’d learned, was to take her time thinking of responses to various arguments.
Sorry, Celia, but those Aberzombies can suck it.
Nah, too confrontational without any constructive stuff in there.
I’m sorry you thought I was unfriendly, but you didn’t see all the stuff they said before you got there.
Too “telling Mommy on you.”
Sighing, Dimple shampooed her curls, taking care to massage her scalp. It was something that could consistently lower her blood pressure and erase the crap out of any day. If she had the money, she’d just go sit in a salon and have them shampoo her hair for a full day.
As the smell of coconuts and jasmine filled the shower stall, she thought about the anonymous donor who’d paid for the meal. She was 95 percent sure it was Rishi, though he’d never admitted it. He was different from what she’d expected. Rich but not showy about it. Goofy and easygoing, but with a backbone. Utterly sure of himself in a really comfortable way. There was something about people who were that secure; they made you feel better about yourself, like they accepted you for everything you were, imperfections and all.
Dimple rinsed her hair out and got out of the shower, making her way back to the room in her gray terry cloth robe. She opened the dresser drawer and looked at her pajamas. All she’d brought were some ratty old T-shirts and sweatpants she’d had since freshman year of high school. For just a beat, she felt intensely self-conscious and considered going through Celia’s drawer for something more . . . girly. But then the rest of her brain caught up to her and annoyance replaced self-consciousness. Seriously? Rolling her eyes at herself, she threw on her Silly Boys, Coding Is for Girls T-shirt and plain gray fleece pants. They’d lost their drawstring eons ago and were baggy in all the wrong places, but whatever.
Dimple was finger-combing her hair when her phone rang. Frowning, she walked over, hoping Rishi wasn’t canceling. But her parents’ faces flashed on the screen.
She grabbed the phone and slid to answer. “Papa?”
“Dimple?”
She straightened up, gearing for an argument. “Mamma.” Papa had probably told her about their last conversation; that she and Rishi Patel weren’t going to happen.
“ Kaisi ho? I . . . miss you, beti. ”
“I talked to you this morning,” Dimple said, but she knew what Mamma meant. They’d barely talked. And Dimple had been too angry to have a real conversation.
Dimple sank down on her bed, a lump forming in her throat. Mamma’s voice was soft, defenseless like she’d never heard it. It reminded her of being sick when she was little, how Mamma used to come sit on the edge of her bed, smooth her hair back off her feverish forehead, and give her milk with turmeric in it. Haldi doodh, Mamma’s magic fix for every situation. It usually worked. Dimple would kill for some right now. “I miss you too, Mamma,” she said thickly.
“Did you eat dinner already?”
Ha. If only you knew. “Yeah, I ate dinner. At a new restaurant, Elm.”
“Kaisa tha? You liked?”
Dimple blinked. No, I hated , she wanted to say. The people sucked. My roommate has new zombie friends, and they all think I’m a freak. But at least I didn’t have to pay. Swallowing, she said, “Eh, it was okay, I guess. Nothing like your prawns curry.”
Mamma laughed, obviously pleased. “There is no cooking like home cooking!”
Dimple snuffled a laugh. That was one of Mamma’s mantras. Anytime Dimple kvetched about wanting to order a pepperoni pizza because she was tired of eating something Mamma was cooking, Mamma would bust out with that. “Mamma, did Papa tell you about . . . Rishi?”
She heard Mamma’s deep breath. “Haan.” A long silence followed. Dimple imagined little crystals of disapproval forming along the phone line.
“I know you’re not happy. But honestly, I just—”
“Beti.” Dimple stopped. “It’s okay. No problem.”
But she didn’t sound convinced. There was something guarded about Mamma’s voice.
“It’s not that I don’t like him,” Dimple said. “He’s nice. I just . . . I need some time, Mamma. To be by myself. To find out what I want from life.”
Another silence as Mamma processed this. “Okay.” From the slow, heavy way she said it, Dimple knew what a Herculean effort it must’ve taken.
“Okay? Really?” Shut up, Dimple, she told herself. If the woman says okay, just run with it! “Thanks, Mamma.”
She knew Mamma didn’t understand what time had to do with anything. In her eyes, women went to college just to make themselves more marketable to guys. For her to say that just showed how much she was willing to take into account the changing times. And her strange daughter.