Fanfare by Renee Ahdieh Page B

worry too much though. Hana is going to love you. Gita . . . might take a little while, but she’ll come around.”
    He chuckled. “Well, so much for not worrying . . . It’s a pretty city, by the way.” He gazed at the skyline in the distance to our left. The lights of uptown Charlotte twinkled with flashing effervescence. It was a pretty city . . . even if it couldn’t compare to a New York or a Los Angeles, Charlotte had a charm and grace that was all its own.
    “I love it here. You can experience city life when you want to, but Charlotte hasn’t lost its grasp on its roots . . . sometimes in a bad way, but more often in a good way,” I remarked honestly.
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean, we are in the south. People are generally warm and hospitable, but it’s not nearly as progressive as . . . London, for instance,” I responded.
    “London is not as warm and hospitable as it could be, so I suppose there are pluses and minuses to each.” Tom had a way of being obscenely diplomatic and fair-minded. I often teased that he should have gone into politics rather than the movie industry. He usually remarked that the two weren’t very different anyway. Of course, on top of everything else, he also had to have a quick sense of humor.
    I pulled into the spot in front of Naz and Hana’s home while Tom hid behind the hat and sunglasses once more. I saw Hana peeking through the blinds in the front and stifled a giggle. She had probably waited there, wearing a perfectly pressed apron for the last twenty minutes. I made sure no one else was around us before we moved silently from the car to the front door, unseen. It opened soundlessly before us, and my nostrils were inundated by the delicious scents of the Middle East: cumin, cinnamon, coriandor, nutmeg, turmeric. I breathed in deeply. In a past life, I think I must have been from this part of the world. The food and the music always called to me with an inexplicable familiarity.
    “Well, it’s about time!” The lyrical voice of my best friend echoed peevishly around us.
    As I foretold, Hana Fateri stood in front of me wearing designer jeans and a turquoise kurta blouse from India covered with a carefully pressed apron bearing the words “Chef de Cuisine.” Her waist-length hair was knotted in a loose bun at the nape of her neck. She stuck her hand out towards Tom before I even had a chance to say anything.
    “I’m Hana. It’s really nice to meet you, Tom,” she chirped. The look on her face was preciously mock-worthy. She was trying so hard to remain calm and treat Tom as though he were merely an average human being instead of a famous celebrity whose face emblazoned the magazines and blogs she loved so much.
    In stark contrast, Gita Talukdar was still seated in her chair with her arms crossed over her chest, staring warily at Tom the Movie Star. In one fluid motion, she rose to walk towards us with the graceful lope of a stalking panther. She waited patiently to be introduced. From the corner of my eye, I saw Tom smile quickly when he realized how enlightening a testament the differences in a mere introduction were to their personalities.
    He put out his right hand and smiled awkwardly at Gita. “I’m Tom. You must be Gita.”
    Wordlessly, she held out her hand and shook his firmly with a nod of assertion. She ran her gaze over his tall frame with a shameless look of open judgment.
    “Jesus, Gita! Can you be any more obvious?” Hana cried as she smacked Gita’s arm.
    “Shut it, Fateri. I can’t help who I am,” she muttered as the color rose in her neck.
    “I like it. No bullshit. It really doesn’t bother me,” Tom responded genially. He began pulling off his shoes as I had directed him to do earlier. No shoes were permitted in Hana’s house past the front door. Halfway through awkwardly removing his left sneaker, he teetered perilously to one side and would have crashed to the floor if I hadn’t grabbed his arm just in time. So much for not