“Reena, did you hear Khizar is being considered for junior partner in his firm?” Dad asked. No surprise he changed the subject—a cookbook project couldn’t come close to the prestige of his eldest child being promoted in one of the capital’s biggest accounting firms.
And that’s when Reena decided she had done her filial duty for the week. Time to get the hell out of this house. She had already heard about Khizar’s likely promotion—he’d texted her about it before he’d even told their parents. But any conversation with Mum and Dad about her brother’s success would very quickly delve into the type of firstborn hero worship that usually left Saira in tears and Reena wondering if a thirty-one-year-old could emancipate from her parents. True, Khizar always outshined his younger sisters, with a great job, a loving wife, and not one, buttwobabies on the way (trust Khizar to take overachievement way too far). But Khizar also had the distinction of being the nicest of the three of them. Reena tried to avoid the sibling rivalry her parents seemed to want to instill, lest she start to resent the only member of her family she really trusted. She knew her limits—she already felt mighty small because of Saira’s cookbook news. Khizar’s absolute winning at adulting might be a bit too much to pile on top of that heap of self-loathing.
Reena mopped up the final puddle of channa on her plate with the last bit of her puri. “I didn’t notice the time.” She took her plate to the kitchen, rinsed it, and placed it in the dishwasher. “I have to feed…Brian.” Crap. That was a terrible excuse.
“Brian? You got a dog?” Saira asked.
Mum snapped her head toward the kitchen. “Keeping dogs is haram in Islam. You can’t have a dog.”
“I don’t have a dog.” Reena sighed. “Brian is a sourdough starter. A rye bread one. Get it? Bri the rye?”
Mum’s nose wrinkled. Reena needed to get out of this house before Dad and Saira joined in voicing their displeasure about Reena’s obsession with bread.
Saira’s face puckered in the exact expression Mum had just sported. Uncanny, really. “I guess rye flour is better than all that refined wheat, but maybe you’re taking this little hobby too far?”
“Noted, Saira. Thanks for brunch, Mum and Dad. See ya later.” Reena rushed out before someone else could drag her through the mud. And she really did need to feed Brian.
CHAPTER THREE
Twenty minutes later Reena stood in her kitchen, thinking about how to save poor Brian. She lifted the jar and held it up to the midday sun. Some minuscule bubbles dotted his grayish surface, but those were probably just regular bacteria fermentation—not yeast development. Sue, her other starter, tripled last night, with large airy bubbles and a pleasant acidic smell when Reena lifted it to her nose. Sue always behaved. Brian had always been tricky. Her first rye starter, he preferred spring water instead of filtered. Organic rye flour instead of regular bulk-store stuff. And even then, like this morning, sometimes he still refused to do what Reena expected of him. She wasn’t going to give up on him yet, though—she’d try increasing his feedings before taking drastic efforts.
After carefully weighing equal amounts of rye flour and spring water, she stirred them into the jar. As she fastened a rubber band around it, her phone rang and the screen lit up with the knowing scowl of her best friend holding a blackberry-lavender cupcake. Reena had snapped the picture months ago, when Amira had been ranting about sexism in cupcake shops. Her expression had been so quintessentiallyAmirathat Reena wanted to preserve it for eternity.
“Meer,” Reena said instead of hello, “remind me again why distancing myself from my toxic family means still going to family brunch?”
“You’re supposed to distance yourselfemotionally, Ree. We’re Indian, it’s impossible to distance physically. What’d they do this time?”
“The usual. Dad found me yet another husband prospect. I left as they started their ode:Khizar the Perfect and His Auspicious Promotion.”
“Khizar’s not really perfect, you know. Remember the time he tried to make a salad and burned the lettuce?”
Reena snorted. She’d forgotten that one. Smiling, she closed the jar of sourdough.
Amira had been Reena’s best friend since grade two, and their friendship lasted through tween drama and high school fights over cute boys and loaned makeup. Amira had left town a few times over the years, twice for university, and again about two months ago for a job and to live with her boyfriend, and Reena had not forgiven her friend for abandoning her yet again. They still spoke daily, though, and probably always would.
“How was Saira?” Amira asked.
Reena sighed. “She’s pitching a cookbook to publishers.”
“She’s not.”
“She is. A clean-eating cookbook.” Reena cringed as she placed Brian on his perch on the windowsill.
“The woman who wrote a manifesto against gluttony in food blogs that directly attacked her own sister’s livelihood shouldn’t get to make money writing recipes.”
Reena didn’t want to get into this again with Amira—who would no doubt use it as proof that it was time for Reena to revive her old blog. Uncharacteristically, though, Amira did what Reena usually did—she changed the subject. “Who’d your dad try to set you up with this time?”
“Actually, this is pretty funny. He’s my new neighbor.” Reena told her friend about the brown Captain America (Captain Tanzania?).
“So, your dad moves a buff Tanzanian guy with a British accent and a love of bread next door, and this is a problem for you?” She paused. “Your parents would never force you to marry this guy, would they?”
“No. Not force, but yes, strongly encourage. And then I’d never hear the end of it from them. Mum still claims she found Nafissa for Khizar, remember?”
“Yes, and Khizar and Nafissa have a beautiful love that transcends time and space! Why wouldn’t you want that?”
Reena rolled her eyes as she put away the rye flour. Her previously cynical friend had gone all rainbows and butterflies since she fell in love with a small-town lumberjack-type musician.
“I don’t want what Khizar and Nafissa have,” Reena said. “They had to leave town to get away from the gloating and intrusion from Mum and Dad. I know my parents will intrude no matter who I’m with, but I’d like to minimize their role in my relationships.” Reena shuddered. “They’ve been looking for a suitable match for me for years. Clearly, they have no faith I’m capable of finding someone on my own. Believe me, it’s for their best interests, not mine.”
