“Th-they’re…,” he spluttered. “They’re just…”
“Not Punjabi,” I said. Yeah, that was it.
Dad nodded, worry lines etching deeper.
“She doesn’t care,” I said. “It’s not like we live in Punjab or something.”
“She got into the honors program in medical education at Northwestern,” Dad said, changing tactics. It was true. My sister, the genius, got accepted into the seven-year, straight-from-high-school medical program for gifted students—Mom had known before she passed away that Vinnie would be a doctor. “And he went to UMass.”
“Dad!” I said. “Not everyone can afford to go to private school. It’s not like he isn’t super smart—he got into Feinberg, didn’t he? The same school as Vinnie!”
They had met at medical school—Manish was a year ahead of Vinnie—and they clicked because they were both from the Boston area. Their first date was a baseball game where they were the only two people at Wrigley Field rooting for the Red Sox. I heard about him from Vinnie off and on, of course, but I had no idea how serious they were. When Dad and I went to Chicago for her graduation and Vinnie told us they were engaged, it was a seismic-level shock to our family—but I could see that Manish made her happy, and that was good enough for me. Dad, meanwhile, was still struggling to comprehend our new reality.
“She’s putting him before everything,” Dad said. “She was going to come back here, and now…”
We had always expected that Vinnie would come back to Boston for her residency—there are so many good hospitals here. But when she placed at University of Chicago’s emergency medicine residency program on match day, the same place where Manish was a second-year resident, it was clear that things had changed.
“Dad, it’s natural, isn’t it?” I said.
“And on top of everything, he’s allergic to dogs.” Dad played the trump card.
I sighed, my hand going instinctively to the furry head planted on my knee. Our dog, Yogi, was never more than five feet from me when I was home. I had to admit that Manish’s allergies were a horrible disappointment. Still, I racked my brain and made an attempt.
“Maybe he’ll try allergy shots?” I asked. Weak, I admit, but valiant. “They do work on some people.”
“Who knows what the family is like,” Dad mumbled ominously. “We haven’t met them even once.”
“I’m sure Vinnie has spoken to them plenty of times,” I said. She probably had. I pushed back my chair.
“Dad, we just have to deal with him,” I said. “He’s going to be family.”
“Well, I’m not paying for a lavish wedding out of your college fund,” Dad said.
“It doesn’t have to be lavish,” I said. “But we have to do something special, Dad—it’s Vinnie’s wedding!”
“It’s not just the money,” Dad said. “She doesn’t have time to plan it. I don’t have the bandwidth either—you know how things are at work!”
“I have time, Dad!” I said. Something about holding the jewelry Mom had left us made me want to make sure Vinnie had a rocking Punjabi wedding. One Mom would approve of. “I could do it.” It was true. I had over two months of summer vacation!
“Nonsense,” he said. “You might be taking the SAT again; that’s much more important. And you have math tutoring, college visits, the common app, and supplemental essays to draft and whatnot. You’re not responsible enough to plan a whole wedding—you’re seventeen!”
I bristled at the words, but it was no use arguing with him right now. Plus, thinking about getting my SAT score back in approximately two weeks actually made me feel ill.
“You’re not wrong,” I said, very calm. “But who knows, I might have gotten a good score on my first try, right?” I felt okay about it but definitely not 100 percent confident. “Can we just wait and see?”
Chapter Two
“I am not interested in doing my math.”
The kid’s solemn eyes could have melted the iceberg that sank the Titanic. For a five-year-old, she articulated every word ridiculously well. But what do you expect from a preschooler who can do multiplication?
“Come on, Kylie, it’ll be fun,” I wheedled, but she darted out from behind her desk and made for the door. I chased her down, tackled her, and carried her back to her work sheet.
Where’s her nanny? I mouthed at Sonal. She was checking algebra work sheets for a bunch of pimply middle schoolers. Sonal shrugged and pointed to the wall.
Nannies sometimes dropped kids off at math tutoring and took off for a coffee next door.
I didn’t sign up to be a summer camp counselor like half my friends, just to avoid wrangling teeny kids. No younger siblings or cousins in the country meant I had no experience with little kids. Who knew that math tutoring would be full of them? More than half the kids who went to Ace Tutoring were elementary age or under. I felt bad for them—doomed to daily math torture for all of summer vacation. At least I got paid for it, and the kids were actually sweet. Turns out I’m not half bad at handling them.
My sister Vinnie and I are nothing alike, but we do have math in common. In high school she played every sport she could fit around her course load—field hockey, soccer, volleyball. I stuck to art, speech team, and drama club—painting sets, designing costumes, and putting makeup on Oompa-Loompas, Munchkins, and the lost boys from Peter Pan. But we’re both math whizzes. She always was, and I became one because Dad would have been crushed if I wasn’t, so I tried extra hard.
But I don’t have the same nerd gene they do, the kind that makes them drop everything to watch Nova specials on things like the Andromeda–Milky Way collision or the structure of DNA. I’d rather watch an art restoration video on YouTube or a K-drama instead.
Kylie slaved through her multiplication tables, to both our relief.
“Gimme five,” I said, and drew a smiley
