Can't Always Get What You Want (28 page)

“How many people did your aunt invite?” I ask, as I gape up at the house. Several lights are on inside, and I can see silhouettes against the drawn curtains.

“No idea. A lot, I’m guessing. We invited the women from both Narayan’s and my families.” She glances at me, and laughs at my wide-eyed expression. “Don’t worry. Auntie Priya and Uncle Vijay have more than enough room.”

“Is everyone staying for the weekend?”

“Looks like it.” She grins.

We get out of the car and grab our bags. Samira pauses a few steps away from the front door.

“Just to warn you, Auntie Priya can be a little, umm…over the top.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. You’ll see. She’s a little bit crazy, but harmless. Just don’t let her anywhere near your hair or face, and you’ll be fine.”

“Umm, okay.”

What the heck does she mean by that?

Samira and I lug my heavy suitcases toward the house. The door flies open just as Samira is about to open it.

“Samira!”

“Hi, Auntie Priya!”

So. This is Priya.

She’s short and curvaceous, and probably quite pretty when she takes her makeup off. Her spackled-on look would make any drag queen proud. I think she’s a little bit older than Nita, and her hair is teased very high at the crown. She kind of looks like an older, Indian Amy Winehouse.

“Come in, come in,” she orders in a soft breathy voice that seems unnaturally high for an adult woman.

“Please, just leave your bags at the door. Harmie will be along shortly.” She rubs her hands together and jumps up and down. “EEEEK! I am so excited you’re here! Come on, the party is in here!”

“Who’s Harmie?” I whisper to Sam.

“Harminder. Their butler. He’s worked for them for years. He’s almost part of the family now.”

Wow. I’ve never met anyone who had real live-in help before. I take in my opulent surroundings, noting that everything from the paint color to the furniture is exactly on trend.

“What does your uncle Vijay do, exactly?”

“Oh, he didn’t make all their money. Auntie did.”

“Really?”

“Yup. Not sure on all the details, but suffice it to say that she has really good instincts on the stock market.”

Huh.

Maybe I should get her to look at my portfolio.

We enter an enormous living room. I’d guess about forty women are milling about.

“Samira!” they all shout as we enter.

Around the room, women are set up with their own henna artists. Priya directs me to a chair, and a shy young woman starts applying the henna to my hands. Nita settles in beside me. She points out everyone in the room, and tells me who’s who.

At long last my mehndi is done.

“Okay, you need to let it dry for about an hour,” the shy girl whispers.

“All right,” I reply.

I’m petrified to move. This is a million times worse than painting your nails and then worrying you’ll smudge the paint. If I make the slightest movement, I might destroy the entire design.

Thankfully, Samira brings the other bridesmaids over and we spend the next hour introducing ourselves. Well, I don’t bother introducing myself to Emmie. We’ve met before. She’s Samira’s cousin, and I’ve always felt a bit competitive with her.

She’s a total cow, of course.

Nita helps me remove the dried henna from my arms and hands, and dabs the design with lemon juice.

“This will help to set the design,” she explains. The rest of the evening passes by with clichéd shower games, singing, and food. Lots of food.

“Sophie, I just have to know what the secret ingredient is. Tell me, please? Pretty please?” Nita whines, while eating her second helping of apple pie.

I motion a zipper over my lips. “Can’t. That is, unless…”

“Unless?”

“We trade recipes. Grandma Lucy’s apple pie for your butter chicken.”

I’ve been after her recipe for years. But Nita is very protective of this particular recipe, for some reason. She even shoos Samira and me out of the kitchen if we’re around when she makes it.

She frowns. “No can do.”

I smile impishly. “That’s my offer. If you change your mind, you know where to find me.”

A loud shriek sounds from the far side of the kitchen. The crowd parts and I see Samira briskly walking toward the front door. She’s clutching a large white tea towel in her right hand.

“You okay?” I ask.

“Yeah, just a dumb mistake. I was cutting some fruit and the knife slipped.”

“Let me see,” I say. It’s a clean cut to the meaty part of her right hand, just below the thumb. The wound isn’t long, but it seems deep and bleeds quickly when she removes pressure.

I push a clean part of the towel back onto the wound.

“You might need a few stitches.”

“Yeah. I’m just pissed that my henna has been wrecked.”

“You slice your hand open, and you’re worried about ruining your aesthetics?”

She scratches her nose with her middle finger.

I grin. “Hey, no judgment. At least you have your priorities in order.”

The trendy, oversized clock on the wall says it’s nearly midnight.

“The after-hours clinics are probably closed by now, but we could go to an ER. You want a ride back into the city?”

“Thanks, but I already saw my mom go outside. She’s probably waiting for me in the car.”

“Okay.” I lean forward and give her a hug. “I’ll wait up for you.”

—

Several hours later, Samira and Nita are still gone, and the party has really died. My eyes are getting heavy, and I’m not sure of where the butler took my bags, so I can’t change into pajamas or anything.

Some of the guests are still awake, clustered into groups of twos and threes. I smile shyly at some of them, and they smile back, but don’t offer for me to join in. I haven’t felt this awkward since high school.

“Bored?” a high voice quips from behind me.

I turn and find Priya standing there, dressed in duck-print pajamas and fluffy pink slippers. Her hair has been combed from its scary beehive, the makeup removed from her face. Were it not for her cartoon voice, I wouldn’t have recognized her.

“Sorry.” I yawn. “Just a bit. I’m waiting up for Samira, but I’m having a hard time staying awake.”

“Hmm…” she muses, tapping her teeth. “How can I keep you occupied…”

Suddenly, her eyes flash. It unsettles me for some reason.

“I know!” she exclaims. “I can give you a makeover!”

“What do you have in mind?” I ask, laughing nervously. Didn’t Samira warn me to not let her near my face or hair?

“Oh, I love makeup,” she titters. “We can try bright, funky eye shadows, bold lip colors, glitter…”

I regard her for a moment. Her hands are balled up into fists, pushing underneath her chin like an overexcited child. I suppose I could indulge her. I mean, what’s a little makeup going to hurt? I can always wash it off.

“Umm, okay.”

Priya jumps up and down and squeals with delight.

“Oh goody! This is going to be
soooo
fun!”

—

“And…” Priya trails off, while applying a final swipe of gloss to my lips. “That’s it.” She wheels me around to look into her brightly lit bathroom mirror.

“Oh, wow, it’s umm…”

My reflection looks like a drag queen on crack.

I notice my eyebrows first. My real eyebrows have been covered up with eye shadow, and redrawn about a half inch above where they should be. It looks like two black caterpillars are marching across my face.

The eyelids are in various shades of purple and black, topped off with a lot of heavy eyeliner and false eyelashes. My face feels so thick with makeup, I can literally hear my pores suffocating.

Poor things. I hope I don’t get a new crop of acne from this makeover misadventure. The rest of my face is covered in a swirl of bronzer, glitter, and lip liner.

“Oh look! Tears of joy!” Priya gushes. “I
knew
you’d love it! Wait, let me go get my camera. We can text Samira some pictures.”

“No!” I shout. I don’t want evidence. Priya pauses, looking surprised.

I clear my throat. “I, err, love it! I want to keep it a surprise for Samira when she comes back.”

Priya nods knowingly, and winks. “Gotcha.”

She steps behind me, and starts toying with my hair.

“Don’t take this personally,” she murmurs, “but your hair color is a bit bland. Washed out. Dull.” She shakes her head sadly, clearly distraught over the state of the mop on my head.

“Oh, really? Well, I’ve always liked it.”

“Henna hair dye would fix it up. Just add some shine and color. You’d look a million times better.”

“You can use henna to dye your hair?”

Priya smile at me indulgently. “Of course you can! Are you up for it?”

I gather my hair into a side ponytail, protectively handling it. Do I dare mess with my beautiful hair just two days before Samira and Narayan’s wedding?

Okay, let’s think this through:

Pros:

A)  It’s something to do right now and will keep me from nodding off into a coma.

B)  Will please Priya (who clearly gets off on doing makeovers).

Cons:

A)  Not a good idea to do something to my hair two days before a wedding.

I mentally consider my options. Henna is natural, right? Surely it can’t stain hair that badly. I mean, it washes off our skin after a few days, so it will probably just wash out of my hair right away.

I turn to Priya.

“Okay. Let’s do it.”

—

OH. MY. GOOD. LORD.

My hair. Is red.

And not some light, lovely strawberry blond red, or a decadent dark auburn.

No, my hair is fire engine red.

“So, what do you think?” Priya asks, clearly pleased with herself.

“Is it supposed to be that color?” I ask, my voice wobbling.

“Oh yes! Don’t you think it complements your skin tone? You were so washed out before,” she clucks sympatheti
cally. “But this really livens you up.”

Okay: deep calming breaths.

I can handle this. Henna is a natural product; it should be easy to get rid of. I’ll just go to a hair salon in the morning. They can fix it.

—

“What do you mean you can’t fix it?” I cry.

I’m sitting in a salon in the nearest town. It’s expensive-looking, and I figured if anyone could fix my hair, they could.

“You can’t put anything over henna, I’m afraid. It’s permanent.”

“P-p-permanent?” I stammer. “Why can’t you just put another color on top of it? Or bleach it out? I don’t understand!”

“Bleach will completely fry your hair, and regular hair dyes won’t touch it.”

I shake my head. I refuse to believe this.

“Didn’t you read the box before you used it?” she asks.

“No,” I pout.
Of course
that would have been the smart thing to do, but some crazy lady in ducky jammies talked me into it.

She huffs in response. “Okay, I’ll break it down for you. Chemical hair dyes lift hair follicles and put the hair color into the hair shaft. Henna just coats it.”

“But then shouldn’t it just wash off?”

“Nope. It forms really strong bonds with the hair. Dyeing over it produces really unpredictable results. I once had a customer who put black hair dye over henna, and it turned purple. Another used dark henna on her hair at home, didn’t like it, and decided to bleach it out. It turned green.”

She runs her fingers through my hair. “I’ve never seen it produce such a bright red before. What’s your natural hair color?”

“Light blond.”

“Ah.”

I feel like bawling. How could I have been so stupid? I take a section of my hair and fondle the ends. I look like I just walked out of an anime convention, or emo support group.

“My friend’s wedding is tomorrow. I’m her maid of honor,” I sniff.

She sucks air between her teeth and grimaces.

“Ouch.”

“Are you sure you can’t do anything for me?”

“Not without really damaging your hair,” she replies.

“So I’m pretty much screwed.”

“Pretty much.”

Chapter 24

Stupid Girl

“Did I or did I not warn you about Auntie Priya?” Samira asks.

“Oh, bugger off,” I say, trying to sound mad (and failing miserably). I can see her shoulders quaking in silent laughter.

“I’m worried that my hair is going to ruin your wedding pictures.” I bite my lip, and peek over at her. “Sorry.”

The car is silent for a moment.

“I look like Ronald McDonald.”

This sets her off again. Oh well, on a positive note Samira is happy and relaxed, even though her wedding is tomorrow. Suppose you could consider that the silver lining.

“Vant to come een for a drenk?” I ask.

“Vould luv to, but I can’t, dahlenk,” she replies. “I should get back.”

She picks up a stray lock of my hair. “You know, you probably could just dye over it with a darker shade of henna.”

“Nuh-uh. No way. I’ve been burned once—I won’t do it again. Knowing me, I’d probably end up with neon purple or something.”

All is quiet again, but for the rumble of her car’s engine.

“What if we got you a wig?”

I smirk and throw my lip gloss at her.

“So, I’ll see you tomorrow at my mom’s house at eight
A.M
., okay?” Samira repeats for the fiftieth time. It’s like she’s paranoid that I won’t show up. Either that, or her inner control freak is coming out. The wedding is tomorrow, and the bride and bridesmaids are getting prettied up at Nita and Ravi’s house before the big production.