Fate is a bitch. When you think you have it all straight in your life, it throws another curveball into your path and changes your views about everything. I thought I could happily graduate high school and then go to Harvard for my degree. But no. There's another problem waiting with its arms spread wide, waiting to embrace and tickle me in my armpits. And that problem is my grandparents.
I know that statement might have arisen a few questions-ok maybe too many questions- like how can grandparents be trouble? When most people think about grandparents, they imagine a wise, old couple with wrinkly faces who dote on their grandchildren. Maybe for most that might be true. But my grandparents are probably not the same. Why? Because I never met them.
Slow down your thoughts right there, pal. I never give out a judgement quickly or without thinking. Let me explain it to you more clearly. You see, my paternal grandparents departed from the world of the living before I set foot in it. The grandparents I just mentioned right now are my maternal grandparents. My mother, Meera Bhaskar Montogomery, was the product of a strictly traditional Marathi couple. Back in her juvenile days, Aai was sent to the United States to complete her higher education by her parents. There she met a handsome French man who swept her off her feet. And that handsome man was Aleixandre François Montogomery aka 'Frank'. And Frank is my father. Frankly speaking, the father of such a handsome son would be a handsome man.
Back to the story, Dad respected Aai's culture and her wishes and waited for her to complete her degree and then went on to ask her parents for her hand in marriage. Guess what? Her parents said a firm 'NO'. Why? Because my father was a poor French man and they wanted a well-to-do Marathi man to marry their daughter.
So what happened next? My parents eloped. Of course, they did, otherwise, I wouldn't have been born. If I wasn't born then the world would have wept in the misery of my absence.
For the next 19 years, my parents built their own company from the ground with their friends as partners in business. Sure there were tough times in the beginning, but their company 'SMG Corp' thrived. The magazines and the paparazzi out there call my parents 'The Power Couple In Suits". Even today, my parents are still obsessed and crazy in love with each other. They still go out on dates with each other, hold hands and make out like teenagers. Even though I'm grossed out by their behaviour, I can't help but admire their love and want a relationship like theirs.
Over the years, Aai tried calling my grandparents to make amends but her efforts were in vain. So Aai kept tabs on them and anonymously helped them however she could. Neither did my grandparents try to contact Aai nor did they try to enquire about her. So imagine my surprise when suddenly they called Aai a week ago.
Turns out they had a change of heart. Though Aai is a formidable and strong woman, she is also very emotional and forgiving. Thus, she pushed aside all those years of silence like it was nothing and planned to visit them just after my graduation. My mother conspired with her two best friends and begged their respective husbands to visit my grandparents this summer instead of going to someplace like the Bahamas.
I did not want to visit them at all. Why would I? This uptight couple didn't care to contact their daughter whereas all this time my mother was pining, praying and missing them at every festival and milestone. Now suddenly, after all these years they seem to have remembered that they have a daughter, whom they are supposed to love beyond reason. I don't get them.
I protested against this idea of vacation but to no avail. After hearing my reasoning, Aai looked at Dad who gave me the expression- the one that says 'disagree with your mother again and face my wrath.' So here I am, on a private jet to India. FYI, I caved because I wanted to see Aai happy not because I was scared of Dad. I'm 18 and don't fear my Dad's lectures. Besides, I can play with tourists out there in India. I've heard a lot about its culture and places.
"Swastik Ethan Montgomery, get up this instant. I've been trying to get you up for centuries- wait, is that romantic music you are listening to?" rumbles a deep voice beside me. Peering through my slits, I see that the voice belongs to a young man wearing shorts and a BTS t-shirt.
"Did you have to jerk me up and about? I was having a fitful sleep." No, I wasn't. Instead, I was lamenting the situation fate had put me into. Deva, fate is a bitch!
"I just woke up and was bored out of my mind listening to Anya and Grace chatter about nail art," says Gregor Antonovich Sokolov, my best friend in the world. Yes, Aai convinced her friends to send their children- who happen to be my friends too- along with me on this agonising journey.
"Damn what good friends I have! One of them wakes me up from my blissful sleep to entertain him." I grumble. I don't like this trip at all, but it is somewhat better with my friends here.
"I don't care, you grumpy bastard. If I continue to hear this nonsense, rubbish chatter, I am sure to lose my mind." Gregor shoots back at me.
"Stop cursing you two! If I hear the lot of you utter such foul words again, I'll tell on you," shouts Anya Yekaterina Sokolov from the seat in front of me.
Gregor and I raised our gazes only to flinch back from the glares we receive from Grace Scarlett Garcia and beautiful Anya.
"Greg, you do know that the words nonsense and rubbish are synonymous, don't you?" Oliver Noah Garcia says in his quiet and calm tone. Noah is the quiet one in the group but no one is as sharp as he is.
"Does it matter, Noah? These girls are going on and on about nails. Aren't there better things to discuss rather than nails?" Gregor mutters.
"It does matter, you dimwit. And what better things do you want to talk about? Football?"Anya spits back.
"At least football is interesting," Gregor replies.
"Guys, stop fighting. You're all disturbing my sleep," grumbles Anya's twin, Luca Lomov Sokolov.
"How do you put up with these two? They annoy me to no end. One is a comment passer and the other is a walking sleeper." Grace, who has been silently glaring this whole time, complains to Anya.
"Hey!" exclaims both Greg and Luca. But both Grace and Anya ignore them.
"No offence, but I like my brother way better than yours, Anya. At least he doesn't bother me as yours do. I wonder how you try to put up with them." Grace says.
And like this, all of them started speaking over one another. This is a pretty usual scene back home which is interrupted when any of our parents cast a look full of disdain upon us.
When everyone starts fighting like this, I usually tune out and get lost in my head. Sometimes I even listen to the childish insults they hurl at each other. While their fights usually leave me annoyingly amused, sometimes I long for the connection they have and I lack.
Growing up, I longed for a sibling to share everything with and I was very vocal about it. How can I not long for a sibling when every single friend of mine had one?
I remember Aai getting a resigned look every time I asked for a sibling. When dad learned about my wishes, he took me aside and told me, "Son, don't you think your mother longs for another child of her own? But this is life and we don't always get what we want. When you were inside your Aai's tummy, you were a very big and strong baby. We almost lost both of you. I cried and prayed to the Lord above to keep you both safe."
"What happened then, Dadda?" I asked him.
"Well, the Lord was merciful and miraculously saved the two of you. I couldn't be more delighted and relieved. But son, remember for every wish there is a price to pay in return and the price we paid made your mother incapable of giving birth again." he replied.
"That means that I am to blame, right? If I was a small baby, I couldn't have hurt Aai." I sobbed.
My father gathered me in his arms and held me. The words he then said are the words I would never forget. He said, "Darling boy, you are not to blame. You were an innocent baby at that time and that condition was not something neither you nor I could control. Never hold yourself responsible for the hand fate played with us. You are the most incredible gift the Lord above bestowed upon us. We would do everything in our power to protect and cherish you. It is because of you today that our family is complete. We are whole because of you in our lives."
And that was not the only moment I felt the love of my parents. There was not a single moment in my life that I felt unloved. Back in the day, my family was not able to adopt because of our financial condition. But as time went on, our trio of a family felt perfect as it and we did not feel the need to add anyone to it. But little things like these remind me of what could have been.
Suddenly my eyes open when the ground below us starts shaking.