“I’m not saying you can’t have the feelings or that you shouldn’t take joy from them. I just don’t want you to get hurt,” India said gently. The expectations, the hopes, the dreams, all the things China wanted from Song were clear in her voice, in the way she breathed when she talked about her. “You can only live in the moment with yourself. But that’s not what you want. You want those feelings returned.”
“She returns my feelings.”
“I know she does. But, sweetheart, she’s not planning to stay.”
“This isn’t the nineteenth century. Every relationship does not have to end in marriage.”
“Okay.” Strong as the urge to fix this for her sister was, India knew it wasn’t in her hands.
“Did you have to ruin it?”
“No. I’m sorry. I do think you’re great together. And you’re so much more fun when you’re getting some,” she added, needing to diffuse the tension between them.
That made China laugh. Her sister was quicksilver, her temper burning hot but her need to return to joy even more stubborn. “Hah! Yes, speaking of getting some. The girl is insatiable.” China’s laugh got all husky and India knew her anger was forgotten. “I think I might have set a record. And you know that I’m already somewhat of a legend.”
“Also somewhat lacking in humility?”
“I came seven times in one night, India! And I wasn’t the one who came the most number of times.”
“TMI, Cee!”
China didn’t care, she filled India in on the details. Which were undoubtedly impressive. India had to admit that she’d never seen her sister this happy. China’s naturally high capacity for joy stretched beautifully at the seams.
Maybe India didn’t need to worry about Song breaking China’s heart. Only the most foolish person would let feelings so precious slip from their hands. Maybe Song would realize how fortunate she was and the two of them would find a way to be together.
Once China had caught India up on every single detail of every single thing Song and she had said and done over the past few days, India gently turned the conversation toward their family.
True to form, Sid hadn’t been in touch with China either. As soon as their brother had access to a network he’d call.
“Mom canceled her classes yesterday,” China said absently. “Nothing to worry about, though, Tomas picked them up.”
“Is it her back?” Tara’s upper back had been bothering her for weeks. No matter how much Mom insisted she was okay, recognizing signs of pain was India’s job. She should never have left without making sure that her mother saw the doctor.
“I think it is. But you know how she is, she will neither confirm nor deny, but her heated buckwheat pad has been going nonstop. She won’t go to the doctor. I tried.”
Obviously China hadn’t tried hard enough. “I’m canceling next week’s session and coming home.”
“I hate when you do that.” India knew what China would say next. “Act like you’re the only one who can fix things. Act like you’re the only one who wants to fix things.”
“That’s not what I’m doing. But Mom has to see the doctor. It’s not a choice.”
China made an infuriated sound. “I will drag her there if I have to. You don’t have to come home.”
“You sure?”
Another infuriated sound. “Of course I’m sure. I get that you run the family business, that you’ve taken it all on because Sid and I weren’t interested, but you do it because you love it, right?”
“Yes.” The family and the studio were what made her her. It was just that she found it easier to take care of things herself instead of relying on someone else, even her siblings.
“You know I would help you with the studio if I could bear to,” China said, her distaste at having to do such a thing palpable in her voice.
India didn’t need another rundown of all the reasons why her life was boring, why she was passionless for toeing the family line. “Mom and I don’t need your help with the studio, we’re fine. It’s just not like Mom to miss classes. She needs to see a doctor. In fact can you call Trisha and run this by her?”
Trisha Raje was a neurosurgeon, so not quite an internist, but Trisha was one of China’s closest friends. Trisha’s cousin Ashna lived next door to the Dashwoods. The Raje cousins and the Dashwood sisters had been friends for years, their friendships solidifying in adulthood because both families tended to be private and slow to trust strangers.
“I’ll call Trisha and Mom’s doctor as soon as I get off the phone with you. You stay right where you are and don’t worry about it. You know I can be an adult when I focus really, really hard.”
India had another week-long corporate gig coming up with a week’s break before it. It was much less work than a full retreat because she just needed to lead morning yoga sessions and then give a couple lectures about stress management and she’d get paid several times as much as the retreat paid. “Thanks. It would be unwise to give up that kind of money.” But something about not taking care of Tara herself didn’t sit right inside her.
“Yeah, no need to . . . Hold on . . . Oh God . . .” There was a scrambling sound and India heard the television volume turning up at China’s end.
“China, what’s wrong?”
“Oh my God.” That was not China’s emotional drama voice. It was real horror.
“Cee! Will you please stop saying that? You’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”
“Oh my God,” China said again. “Oh no. It’s Yash Raje. Something is wrong.”
A sharp and dark feeling twisted in India’s heart.
“What are you talking about?” It had been a decade since India had seen Yash. In person. You couldn’t avoid him on TV no matter how hard you tried. She was friends with his sisters and his cousin and they thought the sun shone out of his . . . well, out of one of his orifices.
She had thought so too. For precisely one day.
She hated the panic that gathered in her body. By all accounts, her experience with Yash Raje had been some sort of aberration. With everyone else he seemed like a perfectly stand-up guy. Not that any of it had mattered in a very long time. No matter how angry she’d been with him, she most certainly did not want anything to be wrong with him.
Please let nothing be wrong with him.
“Is it the polls? Has he dropped in the polls?” India tried not to follow politics, and she’d avoided it even more since Yash announced his candidacy, but she wasn’t an ostrich either.
Over the phone, China let out a gasp. “It’s not the polls.” Her voice was shrill with tension. This was bad. Really bad. “Oh God. Oh no. I think Yash has been shot.”
Chapter Three
The last time Yash had emerged from general anesthesia he’d been fifteen years old and surrounded by a roomful of family. Every one of them with swollen yet dry eyes. No doubt because his parents had warned his siblings to make sure they did not cry in Yash’s presence because he needed them to be strong.
This time when Yash regained consciousness he was all by himself. Disorienting as this was, it was also a relief, considering how on that day twenty-three years ago he’d been told he would never walk again. He wiggled his toes and moved his legs just to make sure he could.