Page 53 of Mrs. Pandey
I knew I'd messed things up, but I was determined to fix it. Taking a deep breath, I reached for his hand, but he pulled away like I had the plague.
"Don't... we're in public."
"But we're also husband and wife," I retorted, keeping my voice low, just for him.
"This isn't working in the village, Warrior. They already think you're some kind of 'characterless woman.' I don't need them thinking worse. Just keep your distance from me." His jaw tightened, and he stalked off.
An excuse. That's all it was. He just didn't want to be close because, deep down, he was feeling things he shouldn't.
"Bahu!" Prashant's mom was suddenly in front of me, arms crossed, eyes narrowed into slits. "I've been calling you repeatedly, but you're too busy having a little romance with my son. What kind of woman are you, really?" Her hiss was right in my ear, making me flinch. "Just mind our reputation. You already did enough damage last night. Please, just please, don't drag us so low that we can't look our relatives in the eye."
"I'm sorry," I muttered, meeting her gaze head-on.
"Lower your eyes!" she snapped. "Daughters-in-law don't meet their mothers-in-law's eyes."
"I'm looking at you to listen, not to defy," I shot back, and her eyebrows did a quick dance of surprise.
"You really have a sharp tongue, don't you?" Her eyes felt like they were drilling holes straight through my skull. If I had a sharp tongue, she had eyes like surgical blades, precise and cutting.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Pandey..."
"Maa..." She cut me off, sharp as a knife. "Call me 'Maa' because you're sharing my son's last name now, and it won't look good if you call me Mrs. Pandey."
"Okay... Maa..." The word felt alien, a bitter taste on my tongue. I winced. She didn't feel like my mom, not even close, but I knew I couldn't disrespect her.
"Well, I have work for you," she said, a twisted smirk playing on her lips. "You need to prepare kheer for my hundred guests. It's our ritual. On the second day of marriage, our Bahu makes something sweet to win the hearts of her in-laws. I hope you won't disappoint me this time. Good luck."
Before I could even open my mouth to ask a single question, she spun on her heel and walked away, leaving me standing there, wondering if I'd just been assigned a sweet dish or a suicide mission.
My head spun. One hundred guests? Kheer? The last time I'd cooked for more than two people, it was instant noodles for my mom and me. And even then, she'd joked about how I nearly set off the fire alarm. Kheer, for those blissfully ignorant souls who've never had to confront it, isn't just a dessert. It's an Indian mother-in-law's secret weapon. A test of domesticity, a symbol of a daughter-in-law's worth. If I failed in this task I would fail at being the ideal Indian bahu.
I marched into the kitchen, a battlefield of gleaming steel utensils and suspicious-looking spices. It was huge, intimidating, smelling faintly of turmeric and expectations. Prashant's mother, or Maa, as I was now supposed to call her without wincing. A twisted grin, she had when she told me that ritual like she knew my culinary skills extended only to ordering takeout and making burnt toast.
"Bhabhi, you need help?" A giggling cousin-in-law, bedecked in far too much jewellery, peeked in.
"No, I'm good," I chirped, trying not to sound pissed off. My hands, however, were already trembling. Hundred guests. One hundred bowls of creamy, sweet, perfectly cooked rice pudding.
I found a mountain of rice, a lake of milk, and a small hillock of sugar. Okay, Ira, basic logic, I told myself. Rice, milk, sugar. Cook. Stir. Don't burn. It was simple but how?
I poured the milk into the largest pot I could find, it was big enough to bathe a small elephant and placed it on the stove. The flame roared to life. Next, I took rice and rinsed it meticulously, remembering a cooking show where the chef looked like he was performing heart surgery on the grains. My hands, though, moved with the grace of a bricklayer.
The milk began to simmer, threatening to boil over. I grabbed a ladle, one of those giant ones that could double as a shovel, and started stirring. Stirring, stirring, stirring. My arm ached. Minutes turned into an eternity and sweat trickled down my forehead, stinging my eyes.
"Is it supposed to be this thick?" I muttered to myself, peering into the milky vortex. It wasn't getting creamy; it was justbubbling angrily. And was that a faint smell of something sticking?
Panic surged through me. This wasn't like making instant coffee. This was a ritual, a sacred performance. If I messed this up, I would not only disappoint Maa, but I'd also confirm every villager's suspicion that I was, indeed, a "characterless woman" who couldn't even cook. Prashant's words echoed in my head, "They already assumed you were a characterless woman." Now I'd be the characterless woman with the worst kheer maker.
I turned up the flame, thinking, foolishly, that more heat would speed up the process. But it was a big mistake. Suddenly, a loud hissing sound erupted from the pot. A plume of acrid smoke billowed up, assaulting my nostrils. "Oh, no, no, no!" I cried, frantically trying to stir faster, to save whatever was salvageable. The milk, or what was left of it, had begun to caramelize at the bottom of the pot, turning a dark, ominous brown.
"Damn it!" I yelled, dropping the ladle. In my haste to pull the burning pot off the stove, my hand slipped. The edge of the hot metal seared into my skin. A sharp, piercing pain shot through me, making me gasp.
"Agh!" I yanked my hand back, clutching it to my chest. A red welt was already forming on my palm, angry and throbbing. Tears welled up in my eyes from crushing frustration. The kheer was ruined, my hand was burnt, and I was officially the worst bahu in the history of Indian weddings. I was already the worst wife.
I stood there, a defeated warrior in a smokey kitchen, the smell of burnt milk and my own failure hanging heavy in the air. Maybe Prashant was right. Maybe I was just wasting my effortstrying to fit in. Some battles, it seemed, you were destined to lose. And kheer, for me, was definitely one of them.
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Chapter 25
