The Mistress of Spices by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni Page B

a picture also, he has written, maybe the parents will agree. What a fine news I think and offer thanks to Goddess Durga, and immediately as Ramu comes home I tell him. He is not so eager, he says she is brought up here, can she live in a big joint family in India. And Sheela of course is saying O I don’t want to send my only daughter so far away. Woman, I tell her, you are simply having no sense. Didn’t your own mother have to send you far too? You must do what is best for her. Even from birth a girl’s real home is with her future husband’s family only. And what better family can we get for our Geeta than Jadubabu’s people, such old, respected brahmins whom everyone is knowing in Calcutta. Okay says Ramu at last, we’ll ask Geeta.”
    He pauses to suck in breath.
    I want to shake the slow story out of him, but I press my nails into the counter and wait.
    “Well, Madam comes in late as usual, nine P.M., saying I ate already, remember I told you some of the guys were going for pizza. I am wanting to say, Since when are you some of the guys, but I practice self-control. Her father tells her about the letter. Dad, she says, tell me you’re joking. She laughs and laughs. Can you see me with a veil over my head sitting in a sweaty kitchen all day, a bunch of house keys tied to the end of my sari. Ramu says Come on Geeta, it’s not going to be like that. But I say What’s wrong with that, Miss High Nose, your grandmother, God keep her soul at His lotus feet, did that all her life. She says,No disrespect, Gramps, it just isn’t for me. And while we’re on the subject, arranged marriages aren’t for me either. When I marry I’ll choose my own husband.
    “The look on Ramus face is not so happy and Sheela’s eyebrows are starting to squeeze together. I begin to tell them, Are you hearing this, for this reason I told you long time back to send her to Ramkrishna Mission boarding school in Chuchura, when she interrupts me and says, the words rushing out all together, I guess this is as good a time as any to let you know that I’ve already found someone I love.
    “Chee chee
, no shame at all, making talk of love in front of her parents, in front of me, her grandfather.
    “After they get over the first shock Ramu asks, What’s this now and Sheela asks, Who is it. Then they ask together, What does he do and Do we know him.
    “You don’t know him, she says. Her face is red and she is holding her breath tight like when underwater and right away I know something even more inauspicious is coming.
    “He works at the company, he’s a project manager. She is being silent one full minute. Then she says, His name is Juan, Juan Cordero.
    “
Hai bhagaban
, I say. She is marrying a white man.
    “Dad, Mom, she says, please don’t be upset. He’s a very nice man, really, you’ll see when I bring him home to visit. I’m so glad I finally got it off my chest. I’ve been wanting to tell you a long time. To me she says, Grandpa, he’s not white, he’s Chicano.
    “What is that meaning, I ask. But already I know it is nothing good.
    “When she explains I tell to her, You are losing your caste and putting blackest
kali
on our ancestors’ faces to marry a manwho is not even a sahib, whose people are slum criminals and illegals, don’t say
O grandpa you just don’t understand
, you think I don’t see TV news.
    “Sheela is crying and wringing her hands, saying I never thought you’d do this to us, is this how you repay us for giving you so much freedom even though all our relatives warned us not to. But Ramu is sitting total quiet. I want to say to him, Once you let cow out of the barn, you cannot stop it from trampling the paddy field. But when I see his face I don’t have the heart. I only say, Ramu you please put me on a plane to India tomorrow.
    “Dad, Geeta says, Dad. She shakes his arm. Say something.
    “He jerks away like he is getting electric shock. A muscle is jumping small and tight in his cheek. I remember