Page 18 of The Love Match

Ugh! Why couldn’t he be a dweeby Deshi guy?

Sadly, his fashion sense doesn’t translate to his conversationskills. Just like our first date, he doesn’t issue a single word of his own accord as his mother passes glasses of freshly squeezed lemon sharbat to my siblings and tea to the rest of us.

He sips from his cup, scrolling through his phone and pretending I’m invisible, while the adults make small talk about some mogul on the Bangladeshi news who hails from one of the only surviving princely estates in Bangladesh—“You know,hischildren must appreciate traditional values”—and Arif does his best to entertain a squirmy Resna.

At last, it’s Harun’s father who helps us along by suggesting, “Harun, while your mother prepares dinner, why don’t you give Zahra a tour of the house?”

He nods and stands up, raising an expectant eyebrow at me when I don’t immediately move to do the same. I gulp. Something about Harun’s piercing gaze makes me feel very small when I’m with him, and I’m not sure I like it.

“Come on. Let’s get this over with.”

As he guides me from room to room, I try to keep my jaw from toppling to the polished wooden floor, mostly because I don’t want to give him the satisfaction. A mahogany table long enough to feed a dozen people sits under a crystal chandelier, gleaming china arranged behind glass in a complementary showcase my mother would sell her soul to own.

“This is the dining room,” he says, as if I’m too poor to have ever seen one.

“It’s nice.”

“Thanks.”

The conversation drags on like this, rinse and repeat. He takes me through a gigantic kitchen with a marble island and countertops, several pristine bathrooms, his father’s study, a guest bedroom, and a game room packed with an Xbox, a PlayStation, and a Nintendo. There’s even a pool table, poker cards and chips scattered across the green surface.

“You must always have friends over,” I say.

“Sometimes.”

And that’s that.

Although I’m certain Arif would combust from the pure excitement of being around so many gaming consoles, it’s when I enter the library that I freeze mid-step, a wonder-struck gasp spilling from my lips. Towering wooden shelves cover every inch of the room, filled with more books than I’ve seen in my life. Thefancykind, with gold foil titles across leather spines. The kind you’d expect to flip open and find “First Edition” on the copyright page.

Harun turns to observe me, but while my pride shrivels at the idea of him sensing my envy, I can’t help gazing longingly at the shelves.

I’ve always considered libraries my haven; they’re not only where I learned to read, but where I learned tolovereading—where little Zahra, at the tender age of ten, decided her lifelong dream was to see her own name on the cover of a book, in a place just like this.

My date regards me for an instant, while I squirm like Belle beneath the Beast’s mercurial contemplation. When hespeaks, his voice is soft, even sheepish. “These are my father’s books. No one comes in here. The decorator ordered them when we moved in.”

I read between the lines: the library is no more than a status symbol.

“That’s so sad,” I whisper, before I can stop myself. “No offense! I just meant… I love to read. But of course that doesn’t meanyouneed to or anything.”

He shrugs and motions for me to follow him upstairs, but I catch the slightest frown on his face. It vanishes by the time we reach the top of the steps.

“My parents’ room,” he explains, waving at a shut door. Next, he points at another door farther down the hall, this one half-cracked. “And that’s mine.”

“Can I see it?”

His forehead wrinkles at my eagerness, for once completely unfeigned. “I guess.”

Before he turns away, I notice that his ears are scarlet beneath the black locks that curl around them. With his hands shoved inside his pockets, he skulks toward his room, then stops to hold the door open for me.

His bedroom is huge—as expected—but that’s where all my predictions end. Unlike the game room, there isn’t much to hint at hobbies or leisure. It’s spartan and neat: a desk along one white wall holds a lamp, a closed laptop, a small calendar, and graphing paper.

There are trophies, model planes, trains, and colorful animerobots next to framed photographs set on top of a bookcase, lined with STEM textbooks and the occasional comic book or manga in shiny plastic. I wander closer to the photos, stooping to examine every picture.

Family vacations at tropical destinations. Harun presented with trophies, medals, or certificates. His parents and teachers on either side of him, proud expressions on their faces, his own indifferent despite being one of the few students of color present. Always indifferent, even when standing next to kids in the same school uniform who have their arms slung around his shoulders, presented in sharp contrast beside a grinning boy who looks a lot like him.

Maybe he’s actually a cyborg who wasn’t programmed to smile?

One frame lies facedown, shoved haphazardly behind the others. Before I can flip it over, another photo sucker punches the air from my lungs. Harun poses with a gold medal in nothing but a pair of black swimming briefs, his long legs, flat abdomen, and bulging biceps toned, water glistening in his curls, sliding down the sculpted copper planes of his six-pack and angular hips.

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