‘Life has not been so kind to me on that count,’ she says.
I nod.
‘Tell me about America?’ I ask.
What I really want to know is about the chap she went to college with, who keeps cropping up on social media.
‘I had a dream, Vedveer,’ she says. ‘I was always massively trolled because I’m my father’s daughter. It isn’t the same for Alia, and thank god for that, maybe because she got married and moved to the US about the time Appa gained political prominence or because she is an IT professional.’
She exhales, and I feel her breath fan my face. She is sitting back on the sofa, her right elbow on the armrest.
‘I went to a not-so-popular college so that I could get lost. I didn’t want to be tracked down.’
‘I wondered about that,’ I say.
‘I spent most of my time in college by myself, except for when I got into an unfortunate relationship not much before I abandoned my studies,’ she says.
‘What happened?’ I want to know everything about her, what makes her tick, what she does every minute of the day.
‘A guy, a vile gaslighter,’ she says with a laugh. ‘His name is Arjun Mahesh.TittleTattlehad a picture of us having coffee the day you and I met in my office.’
Hmm… Why does she still meet him?
‘Arjun thought I was just another Indian student trying to make it work in the United States,’ she says.
I hold her gaze and say nothing.
‘He must have figured otherwise much later, after COFFEE Before Books & Bras had taken off.’
I let her speak because she clearly wants to speak.
‘He’s probably the one providingTittleTattlephotographs of me from my Ohio days. Arjun is the only other person who could have had those photos,’ she says.
‘Only other?’
‘I’m the other, and I don’t have any,’ she shrugs.
I nod.
‘I ended that relationship by throwing the remnants of a tepid cup of coffee on his face,’ she says, her smile bright.
My eyes settle on the wine on the side table, and we both laugh outloud.
I lean back on the sofa after a while. We are sitting so close, it kills me to not be able to pull her into a rough embrace.
‘Lavanya came into my life the day I ended things with Arjun, and she hasn’t left.’
I hear her breathe.
‘Good things also happened to me in America. Lavanya, and somewhere between running away from trolls and considering society’s opinion of me, I became my own person,’ she says, sitting up and squaring her shoulders.
Aaditha reaches for the wine glass in my hand, then pauses, fingertips grazing mine. She’s undecided. I offer it to her. She takes it slowly, her lips brushing the rim as she sips, leaving a trace of lipstick behind.
‘The idea of COFFEE Before Books & Bras was born on that campus in Ohio.’
COFFEE Before Books & Bras is her story. I let that sink in as I study the wine glass. Do I sip from the spot her lips just touched or turn it, pretend I didn’t notice?
‘My coffee is really good, no?’ Aaditha’s eyes light up. She’s not asking a question.
