We weren't getting good at getting her pregnant, not yet.
"We have a house," I barked.
"You live togethernow?" Maybe-Irene asked.
Tiel nodded, and I didn't miss her sharp intake of breath before she spoke. "Yes, we've been living together since the summer."
"Someone get the rosary beads," Agapi muttered. "My mother's about to have a conniption fit."
"Oh my saints," Mrs. Desai said. She closed her eyes and pressed a napkin to her lips. "How did this happen? Where did we go wrong with her, Vikram?"
I knew Tiel's family leaned toward highly religious, but Tiel was a thirty-year-old woman, and a really fucking independent one at that. She didn't require her parents' approval for anything. I wanted to jump in, but Tiel's mother started shouting at her father in Greek. They went back and forth, gesturing wildly and slamming hands, glasses, and utensils like they were punctuation. Everyone else stared at their plates and snuck wide-eyed sidelong glances at each other.
"Great, that's just great," Tiel said under her breath.
Mrs. Desai pointed to Agapi. "Your sister didn't live with Antonio before they were married," she said. "Now, they might have spent a little more time together than I was comfortable with, but he respected your family enough to know better. Agapi didn't let men take advantage of her like you so clearly do. Why can't you find a decent man, Tiel? Someone like Antonio?"
"Excuse me," I started, but Tiel was already responding.
"This has nothing to do with decency or respecting my family," Tiel said. "If that's your argument, you'll have it without me."
I glanced at Tiel, more than a little shocked by the steel in her voice. I definitely expected some of her trademark stress-babble.
"A man whorespectedyour family would have asked your father's permission before" —she pointed to the hotly debated pink diamond— "before that happened. If you respected yourself, you'd want that, too."
"I'm going to stop you right there," I said.
Mrs. Desai turned an impatient eye on me. "You seem very…nice," she said. I was now certain thatnicemeant anything but that. "But we don't know the first thing about you. You're telling us our daughter is living with you but you couldn't be bothered to ask her father for her hand before proposing marriage. It's a tragedy. This all sounds like another one of Tiel's New York City plans, and you should both be ashamed—"
"I'm going to stop you again," I interrupted. "Your interpretation is wholly inaccurate."
My hand found Tiel's under the table, and I laced our fingers together.
"Are you a churchgoer, Sam? Which parish do you belong to in Boston?" she asked. "You don'tlookGreek Orthodox to me."
"My mother attended services at Mary Immaculate of Lourdes before she passed away. She preferred the Traditional Latin Mass and I've made financial contributions to ensure that mass continues," I said. "She's interred there now and I visit her grave regularly, but I'm not an active member."
Mrs. Desai sniffed. "You won't find a well-regarded priest to marry you in his church if you're not a member of the parish. And not with this living arrangement. I wouldn't want that in my church."
"It's good that we've cleared this up," Tiel started. "But we aren't planning a church wedding."
Whether this was new information to me was irrelevant; I'd marry this girl on a rollercoaster at Disney World if that was what she wanted.
"If you're not married in a church, you're not married in the eyes of God, and you're not married inmyeyes," her mother said. "I know you like everything different and non-traditional, with your pink diamonds and piercings all over your ears and all this silly music, but I can't stand by while you have another make-believe marriage."
Mrs. Desai held up her hands and shook her head, and there was no stopping the growl in my throat.
"I can't do it," she continued. "You're inconsiderate, and you're causing your father and I tremendous pain. All we've ever done is sacrifice, and it's never good enough for you. You're giving me angina, you know. I don't know why you do this to me, Tiel. It's selfish. You have to stop thinking of yourself all the time. You're a child playing house with a man who doesn't have the decency to ask your father's blessing, and that tells me everything I need to know about the two of you."
There were babies cooing and crying, interchangeable cousins whispering, and utensils scraping against crockery, but the only sound I could hear was my pulse roaring in my ears.
I squeezed Tiel's hand before I stood, and pulled out her chair.
"Thank you for having us," I said, "but we'll be leaving now."
"I'm going to pray for you both," Mrs. Desai said. "But honestly, I don't think it's going to help. You're impossible, Tiel."
"I'm sorry you feel that way," Tiel said, looking between her parents. Her teeth sank into her lower lip, and she stared at the table for a moment before she stood. "We won't trouble you with an invitation to the wedding."
