“I missed something,” Jash says.
“Same,” I say at the same time Alok and Anil do.
“That’s a faceoff,” I comment. “But I’m not sure what prompted it.”
“Why do sports have to have so many rules?” Anil complains.
Anil, Alok, and I have been friends since we were kids. At one time, our fathers worked together in the same law firm before mine partnered with the one he’s at now and theirs stayed put. We always wished they’d continued to work together since that meant we got to hang out at different company events.
While we hung out less when our fathers headed for different companies, we still hung out all the time. Then came Jash, whom I met at school. He began hanging out with us when we began dating. I’m glad that didn’t change when he got married.
I miss my friends. I’ve only been in the US for a few days, but it feels like it’s been months already. The time difference doesn’t help. It’s eight at night here and seven in the morning there. An eleven-hour time difference is a lot.
“How much longer in the game?” Anil asks.
I look up again and then search my phone for what it means. “Another eight minutes in this period. Then there’s a twenty-minute break and the last period is twenty minutes.”
“So he’ll be home in an hour?” Jash asks. “Does that mean we get to meet him?”
My stomach flips. “No,” I say, shaking my head. It’d be far too obvious that things weren’t going exactly as I thought they would if they met him. “Some other time.”
“Why are you hiding the hockey player?” Alok asks.
“I just met him. You can wait a while.”
“But seriously, things are going good?” Jash asks, repeating Anil’s question.
“Yes.” It’s not a complete lie. Though it’s not the total truth either.
Things are… unsure. It was obvious he was not happy the night I got here, but the next morning, he seemed less so. Less bothered. He smiled a few times, and just like in the airport when I caught those glimpses, it made my stomach flutter.
He stayed long enough to help me cook something to eat. It was pretty good, too. When he got home, I felt like he was more comfortable with the idea of me being here.
I had a lot of questions, but I didn’t dare bring them up. We were spending time together. Not necessarily talking about anything important, but still being together. Even though questions raged inside me, I didn’t want to break the tentative comfort we were building between us.
The same goes for this morning. I woke up determined to ask some questions, but Julian surprised me with a spread of breakfast foods I’d have had back home. Parathas, puri-sabji, and even some wonderful masala chai. I was so taken by surprise by the sight that all my questions drifted away.
By the time breakfast was over, I was left with a ball of nerves in my stomach because that was really thoughtful. It means he thought about me and cared enough about what I might like to eat to make sure I had it.
That means something, right?
The day passed before I found the determination to have a conversation with him. We spent the day much like we hadyesterday after he came home from practice. Before he left, he pulled up the game on the television for me to watch, though he promised he wouldn’t be upset if I didn’t want to.
I want to. I want to see what he does. It’s his job, and it’s important to him. When I sat down to watch it as the game started, I thought I’d surprise him by knowing what happened in the game, so we could talk about it when he got home.
Thirty seconds in, I called my friends on video. I thought four sets of eyes on the game would be better than one, and together, we could decode ice hockey. Now we’re halfway through the game and I don’t feel any smarter on the subject.
Maybe tonight isn’t the night that we’re going to discuss hockey. Which is disappointing. I really want him to know that I’m trying to learn it because it’s a big part of his life. I was hoping he’d be excited that I knew some things and he’d give me a big smile again.
I love his smile. It’s probably the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
“Why does that fight get a penalty, but not the three before it?” Jash asks, pulling me from my thoughts.
Thankfully, the sports people narrating the game give us a replay and even after watching it twice on replay, I can’t answer that question. I don’t see anything special about this fight over the others. I shake my head. “No idea.”
The screen cuts to someone in the audience wearing a referee striped shirt and holding a sign that says dunce.
“That means that the penalty was wrong?” Alok asks.
