‘We have no relationship, Ananya. Don’t try to fix it ever. OK?’
‘What happened though?’
‘I don’t want to talk about it.’
‘Standard answer.’
‘Yours was a standard question.’
‘You do care for him. You are upset.’
‘I’m upset about paying peak hour rates. Now listen, I’ve fended off my aunts
with great difficulty. It’s only my mom. You have a plan, right?’
She skipped ahead of me. ‘Let’s make it a great first meeting of the families.
We should do something fun together.’
‘Like shoot each other?’
‘Shut up. It’ll be fine. They’d love it that my boyfriend is from IIT.’
‘They won’t ask my grades, right?’
‘They might. But who cares, you will be in Citibank. Listen, we organize an
outing for them?’
‘I am not so sure if our families would like to spend so much time together.’
‘Of course, they would. You leave it to me. Your mom will love me more than
you after this,’ she said as we reached the campus gates.
I received my mother at the Ahmedabad railway station a day before the
convocation. Ananya’s parents flew down, her father using his LTC that allowed
him to fly once every four years. My mother arrived with two suitcases. One had
her clothes and the other contained mithai boxes sourced from various shops in
Delhi.