The petite girl with him, in jeans and a T-shirt and four-inch heels, smiled and waved her hand shyly as if unsure of her welcome. But it was her—it really and truly was the Koyal Khanna! I have to say, she looked very different in real life. Smaller, somehow, though still extremely pretty.
“Hi,” I said.
Vir had gone all the way to Logan in the pouring rain to pick her up?
“You’re so pretty!” she said. “Vir said you were!”
This from the person voted Most Beautiful Face in India.
Yes, I had been reading more Bollywood gossip columns than were good for me.
“Thank you,” I said. “Would you like to have a drink? Lunch is still warm, and we also have dessert.…”
“Later,” she said. “I have to talk to you first.”
“Ohh-kay,” I said.
“I heard that you guys had a big misunderstanding because of me,” Koyal said, immediately getting to the meat of the matter. “I’ve been shooting in New York for my new movie. Love in New York, you know. When I got stuck in Boston trying to fly back home, I wanted to tell you in person. There was nothing between Vir and me! It was all fake dating. We’re just friends! Vir helped me and Bunty meet up in spite of our parents. That was all.”
“Bunty?” I asked. That was a common nickname, but not an actual name.
“Yeah,” she said, smiling shyly. “You know how Vir saw you one time only and he was a goner?”
“He was?” I asked.
“Of course he was,” she said. “He told me all about it. It was like that when I saw Bunty too. He’s from a different community and my parents are very orthodox, even though they let me act and all. They don’t like him because he isn’t like us.”
“Oh,” I said. “He isn’t?” It wasn’t obvious why Bunty didn’t fit Koyal’s family’s idea of a suitable match, as it’s hard to place someone when all you have is that they’re called Bunty.
“No, he’s not,” she said. “But he’s very handsome, I think! And he gets me. All of me, not just the Bollywood star part, but the girl I’ve always been. You know?”
I nodded. You couldn’t not believe her. She sounded 100 percent sincere.
Koyal was still speaking. “And he’s Vir’s classmate from Mayo College, so Vir helped us meet up while he was in Mumbai working with his dad and going to all these parties. Because my parents thought I was seeing Vir, they were okay, because, you know, Vir is like us, and very rich, so even if he wasn’t, they’d probably still approve. But really it was Bunty and me all the time. And then even the media got it wrong. But Vir just thought it was funny and didn’t care because he wasn’t serious about anyone else, and it kept all the girls off his back if they thought he was serious about me.”
“Go on,” I said, drinking in this fascinating glimpse into Vir’s life.
“But now that I see you, I can tell why he wasn’t interested in those stupid girls,” she said. “Because you were over here waiting, and he had to come find you.”
Koyal Khanna clearly had very romantic notions of love and dating. But talking to her had taken a huge load off me. I might even float off the ground. I knew Vir enough to see that Koyal was not at all his type. She would drive him crazy in no time.
“Koyal really likes homemade laddoos too,” Vir said. “And her mom’s not here to make sure she sticks to her diet. So, you want to go get some, Koyal? I am, for sure!” He headed to the dessert table.
“Yes,” Koyal said, scanning the tent hungrily until she spotted the tiers of laddoos. “I’m so going to get some. Oh, hi, Mallika Aunty!”
“Koyal!” Mallu Masi looked very confused. “What are you doing here?”
“Shooting! Got stuck in Boston because of the storm, but Gulshan Aunty, Vir’s mom, said I could stay with them. The rest of the crew is staying at a hotel in Boston.”
“That’s great! Go eat something. Those laddoos are fantastic. Everything else is too!”
Vir had been talking with Ernie Uncle, who looked smug about the fact that we were friends. He gave me a told-ya look before walking off and leaving me with Vir.
“You talked to Koyal,” Vir said. “About…” He waved a hand to encompass us.
“Yes,” I said.
Satisfied? his eyes asked.
I smiled back at him happily—because, yes, I was.
“That is Koyal Khanna, Mini?” someone whispered in my ear. One of Beeji’s friends with eagle eyes had recognized Koyal even in her jeans and T-shirt. “The one from Meri Bollywood Wedding? Wasn’t Vinnie wearing the lehenga from the movie for the wedding? The Mallika Motwani?”
“Yes, she was,” I said.
“But how?”
“The designer is my Masi, Aunty,” I said. “Come, I’ll introduce you to both of them. But please don’t share photographs of Koyal, or ask for autographs.” Koyal was a guest in our house and I wasn’t going to let anyone ogle her.
“Good luck with that,” Vir said.
The house glowed with the fairy lights strung around our trees.
The last group pictures had been taken, the last gift envelopes stashed safely away, the last autographs signed, and the last picture with Koyal Khanna taken (We won’t show anybody the photos, beta, no one!). Koyal herself had eaten her fill of Beeji’s laddoos, to Beeji’s eternal pride.
Outside, Avi and Ari and Rahul floated paper boats in the rainwater overflowing from the gutter.
In the garage Manish and his friends played amazing music. I sat beside Vir, Yogi curled up at my feet, and listened to them play. I’d had no idea that they could sound like that.
And then Manish’s friend Samar took center stage. Samar was a Punjabi from Pakistan, and he sang so beautifully that Beeji wept.
“How he sings, that Samar!” Beeji cried. “That’s what you
