Free The Newlyweds by Nell Freudenberger Page B

and awkward, with a mustache, talking to the other one like he was trying to impress him, and the other one—of course the other one was Ashok.” Kim gave Amina a small, sad smile. “He was much better looking than the star—the most handsome man
I’d
ever seen. I’d sort of made friends with the girls lying on the chairs next to me, and they were making fun of me because I couldn’t stop staring at him. I’m not usually like that”—Kim looked at George, as if daring him to contradict her—“in spite of what my mother might tell you. But I felt like I had to find out who he was. There was a servant, a kid, really, who ran over and brought them sodas—we were all hungry and thirsty, but all we got was that colored water—and when he came back over to our side, the other girls waved him over and asked him. It turned out Ashok was the director’s son.”
    Amina had finished her tea but didn’t know where to put her cup.George had set his carefully on the floor, undrunk, on top of a book with a red cover:
Into the Heart of Truth
. While Kim was talking it had gotten dark outside, in the uncannily sudden way of Rochester evenings.
    “We should get going,” George said. “We’re going to hit the traffic.”
    “On Saturday?”
    “There’s always traffic down here.” George glanced at Kim. “I don’t know how you stand it.”
    “I mostly walk or bike,” Kim said, getting up easily from her cross-legged position. “Everything I need is right here, even my studio.” She looked at Amina shyly, as if she were a celebrity Kim had been longing to meet. “I was thinking—tell me if this is too boring for you—but we’re looking for a new receptionist at Yoga Shanti. It’s probably not much more than minimum wage, but there would be perks—free classes and stuff. My guru is amazing, and I know he would love you.”
    “Thank you,” Amina said. She imagined telling her mother that she was working in a yoga studio: it would be like saying she’d come to America and apprenticed herself to a Hindu priest. Although there was something very appealing about a job in this neighborhood, with someone she already knew, she was grateful to George for his habitual caution about jumping into things.
    “Let’s wait and see once she has her green card. Convenience is going to be most important, since I’ll have to drive her.”
    “I really wish you lived down here,” Kim said quietly, while George was using the bathroom. “Then we could meet all the time.”
    Amina was touched by Kim’s overtures. After her failure with Min, the only women she’d met were Annie Snyder and Jessica. Annie was busy with her children, and according to George, Jessica had a very stressful administrative job at Strong Memorial Hospital. “Neither one of them is going to have a lot of time,” he’d told her. “Don’t take it personally.” She hadn’t taken it personally, but she had been disappointed, and she’d resigned herself to the fact that she would have no hope of meeting anyone before she got a job. She was almost glad for that disappointment now, since it made Kim’s enthusiasm even more thrilling: the most interesting person she had met in Rochester was also the one who wanted to be her friend.
    When they got in the car, George was quiet, but he didn’t seem sorry to be leaving. They had been planning to go to a restaurant for dinner, but once they got back on Monroe Avenue, George asked whether she would mind just picking up a pizza on their way home. Amina said she wouldn’t mind.
    “Kim is wonderful,” she said. “Thank you for taking me to meet her.” Sometimes George said nothing, and in order to continue the conversation, she had to play both parts, at least until something she said elicited a response. She thought that was better than having a husband who couldn’t keep his mouth shut, the kind of boasting, posturing husband she might have found in Desh.
    “And she’s very beautiful.”
    “Do you