Family Meetings

I read Sarah’s post and decided that mine was long overdue. I haven’t written lately because I haven’t spent much time with Baba recently – not as much as I would have liked to. He’s been so busy organising his sister’s wedding that I kinda just left him to it. I was a sympathetic girlfriend when I needed to be and tried my hardest to be understanding and less demanding of his time.

I’d been invited to one part of the wedding. The Islamic equivalent of a wedding reception (in my humble opinion). In fact, he’d invited my family but Amma and Appa were working and my siblings are not the sociable people to come with me. I wasn’t nervous about going on my own surprisingly. I think maybe because I wouldn’t know anyone there.
“Are you sure you want me to come baby?! I don’t want to embarrass you.”

“Don’t be silly! What could you possibly do to embarrass me?!”

“I don’t know but you’re sure you want me there?”

“Definitely baba.”

And so I spent an agonising week trying to decide what saree to wear. And then I spent the whole day before finding accessories to match!

I called him as I pulled into the car park. He told me where to go. As I made my way to the hall, a family with a grandma walked slightly in front. The lady spoke to me in a language (which I presumed to be Bengali) that I didn’t understand.
“Bride or groom?”
“Bride”. She replied telling me that my saree was beautiful and that I looked lovely. Definitely put me at ease but the highlight of this conversation was when the grandmother looked at me and in broken English said “Very tall. Very beautiful” with the widest smile ever.

I walked into the hall with them. I felt a little better. I knew baba would be attending to guests so it was a nice surprise when he was there to greet me. And to find that he’d appointed me a “chaperone” (BM). Someone to keep me company. I told him to not trouble the poor soul who’d been forced to keep me company but he wouldn’t hear of it.  BM sat with me at the table but there’s only so much I could talk about with him. I relieved him of him duties and told him I’d be fine to just sit and people watch. So he left me for a few minutes and in the interim 3 families came and sat with me. I smiled politely but I think I may have been the only non-Muslim there. No understatement.

Baba rushed by occasionally and caught my eye – well it was hard not to considering he looked so handsome and I was trying my best to contain myself! His friends came over every so often and made sure I was ok. To be honest, it was a little uncomfortable. I was being fussed over and it was really not what I wanted. And then baba came over.. With his father. I wasn’t ready for this. So wasn’t ready this. I don’t want to meet your dad I tried to tell him telepathically. But still baba came towards me. And so we were introduced. I as his friend. Because I don’t think I’m ready for our families to know that we’re an actual couple. That we have been for 6 months. The conversation was brief. A hello and how are you? And his father telling the people at the table to look after me (they were his relatives apparently). And then he went on his way of tending to other guests. I tried to blend into the background after this but it didn’t work. Because his father came up to me once more and insisted on introducing me to his eldest daughter. I think she has some idea about our relationship because she couldn’t stop smiling at me and asked me far too many questions.

The event was beautifully done and baba outdid himself on the day. He asked me to wait until the end and his friends were so kind and kept me company throughout the day.

I waited in the car whilst he finished tying up all the loose ends (making sure the caterers were out, the hall was clean and so on). The first thing he did as he got in the car was kiss me. And it wasn’t that intense “OMG” kind of kiss. It was that “I missed you so much” kind of kiss (please tell me if this is TMI btw!). We sat int he car for a few minutes and he just looked at me. I didn’t know where to look. The intensity was overwhelming and I playfully hit him to tell him to stop.

To which he replied “You are beautiful. You look so beautiful today and you carried yourself so well. Thank you”

“For what?!”

“For being you”

And that was enough for me. That being myself is what this boy loves me for.