Page 44 of The Favorite Sister

CHAPTER 12

Brett

“New Year’s Eve?” I vault a puddle in the street, barely clearing its littered shoreline. I’m feeling wildly precious in the shoes Steph bought me, which I’m only wearing because Arch asked so nicely.With the lace dress, she suggested. The last time Arch was in L.A. for work she brought me home a tea-stained, bell-shaped floral paneled caftan. It looks like something straight out of the Green Menace’s closet, but I must admit, it does look rather fetching on me. I think it would have paired cutely with my sneakers, but what’s that old sexist adage?Happy wife, happy life.

I need to say something here, which is that I didn’t set out to own a pair of five-hundred-dollar sneakers. I ended up with them by way of bad weather and distracted walking. I stepped into a puddle on my way to check out the construction at the Soho studio one morning, and I popped inside the first store I came across that featured sneakers in the window display. I didn’t even think to check the price—how much could a pair of sneakers cost?—and the salesgirl had been so sweet and helpful, with nothing but wonderful things to say about SPOKE. I wasn’t about to kill her commission when she rang me up, though I almost fainted when she announced the damage.You’ll wear them every day, she promised when she saw my face, and so to justify the splurge, I have, to the point that Archhas asked me to stash them in the hall closet so that they don’t stink up our bedroom.

The truth is, five-hundred-dollar sneakers are not a splurge for me anymore. I can’t afford to spend like that every day, but to occasionally treat myself and those I love to some big-ticket items without breaking a sweat? Yeah, I can do that. I am in a different tax bracket this season than I was in previous years, and I haven’t figured out how to square that with my role as the “low-income one.” I am proud of how far I’ve come, but I don’t want to alienate the women who relate to my former financial struggles. Unsurprisingly, my colleagues seem dead set on outing me before I am ready to address the discrepancy. They want to punish me for their own cowardice. Yes, I asked the network for more money and I got it, okay? That doesn’t prevent my castmates from stepping up and doing the same.

“I always pictured myself getting married outside,” Arch says, bearing down on the hand I’ve offered her and stepping off the curb like a praying mantis. She’s wearing high sandals too, only hers tie at the ankles with two furry pom-poms.

“We could do New Year’s Eve destination,” I say, looking both ways before crossing the street. “Anguilla?”

“It’s already going to be such a haul for my family.” Arch slips her thin body sideways between two parked cars. “Thank you.” She smiles at me winningly as I hold the door for her.

“We don’t have a reservation,” I tell the hostess at L’Artusi. “Anything at the bar?”

Shehmmms, jamming a fist beneath her chin as she scans her tablet. “Actually, we just had a cancellation.” She punches various coordinates on the screen with her finger and locates two menus, pinning them under her arm. “I have a table open upstairs.”

My eyebrows practically fly off my forehead. No wait at L’Artusi on a Saturday night? Money!

Arch steps ahead of me, grabbing my hand and leading me through the restaurant. I pass a girl who drops her bread knife in recognition. “Brett!” she calls, waving drunkenly. “I love you!” Herfriend seizes her hand, groaning,Oh my God, Meredith.

“Have a good night, Meredith.” I laugh over my shoulder, and Meredith rips her hand away and gets in her friend’s face as if to say,See? She liked it.

“What about a destination wedding at a midway point?” I shout over the Saturday-night racket, clomping up the stairs behind Arch.Pick up your feet, Brett, Mom used to complain as I shuffled into the kitchen, wondering what low-carb nightmare she was making for dinner that night. There are countable moments of silence between Arch’s steps. Another reason my mother probably would have preferred her to me.

At the top of the stairs, Arch pauses, waiting for me to catch up. My first reaction is that there is a glitch in the reservation system, because there are absolutely no tables available up here. There are no tables, period, only people standing around, champagne flutes resting at their hips. Then I see the cameras and Lisa, Arch’s parents, Kelly and Layla and Jen and Lauren and Vince and most staggeringlyJesse, and the collective congratulatory cry is the last piece of the puzzle.

“Arch!” I clasp my hands over my nose, tears springing to my eyes.

“Mom and Dad wanted to surprise you,” Arch says, laughing a little, but her eyes are misty too. “Oh my God, come here.” She grabs my wrist and tugs me into her chest. Everyoneaws, and Arch’s parents approach us first, Lisa, Marc, and the rest of the camera crew steps behind.

“You are really surprised?” Arch’s mom asks, sweetly skeptical. Her smile makes me feel like a hot, hair-covered turd.I don’t deserve to have you or your daughter in my life, I think as I wrap my arms around her neck.

“I am so surprised,” I promise Dr. Chugh, sinking into her warm, plump body like a cushion. This is how my mom would have felt if she had let me hug her more. This is how a mom should feel—soft but solid, with some weight on her, some permanence. Arch gets her stature and long limbs from Satya, her father. I wasn’t sure howthe parents of a first-generation Indian woman would react to their daughter dating a tattooed American with a nose ring and nipples that lactate, but Arch pointed out that she introduced her first girlfriend to her parents when she was twenty-three years old, that she’s thirty-six now, and have I seen her ass? Do the math; there have been many who came before me.

The filthy family money comes from Satya’s side and the progressive female ambition from Dr. Chugh, a retired surgeon at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital who thrust scientific literature onto her wary husband when Arch first came out.There is no medical cure for homosexuality and we have one daughter, Dr. Chugh said, extracting tolerance from reason. She has offered to talk to my father the way she talked to Satya, but the problem is, my father has two daughters.

I release Dr. Chugh and lean back to get a better look at her. Dr. Chugh wears the same uniform whether it is day or night, summer or winter: a dark blazer, dark soft jeans, red or navy loafers, and always, a colorful silk scarf that starts exactly where her gray-streaked bob ends. “Thank you so much,” I tell her. “You planned this?”

“We suggested Per Se but Arch says that is notyour style.” Dr. Chugh deploys the bunny ears after she finishes speaking, though it’s clear the words they are meant to bracket. “We arenot cool.” The bunny ears come after, again.

“I saidPer Seis not cool, Mom,” Arch says, planting a kiss on the top of her mother’s head.

I laugh. “You are the coolest, Dr. Chugh. You too, Satya.” I rise up on the balls of my feet to hug Arch’s dad. His hug is weak; but it is a hug.

“We are happy for you both,” Satya says. He pats me on the shoulder and his hand gets tangled in my hair. We laugh, awkwardly, as I weave him free.

Arch rests her elbow on her mother’s shoulder. Like Kelly, she’s a head taller than the woman who bore her. “Mom and Dad want to know if there is any way they can convince you to have the wedding in Delhi.”

“We were married at the Roseate,” Dr. Chugh says. She swoons, remembering. “Beautiful.”

Satya nods, eyeing the boom pole above our heads uncertainly. “It really was.”

Arch walls her face with her hand and speaks out of the side of her mouth to me. “We’re not getting married at the Roseate.”

“What did you just say?” Dr. Chugh swats her daughter.