OVER MY HEAD

OVER MY HEAD, Chapter 2

Hari and I don't move. We, obviously, are not thrilled. How exciting is it for me to belong to a pool, seeing as I don't swim and never plan to? And forget swim lessons. That is not going to happen. As for Hari? He's in college. Nothing excites him anymore. 

"I gotta tell Bethany," Doodles says. "Can I call her?" 

"Of course," Dad says. 

"But in a minute," Mom says. "We need you to sit just a while longer." 

While Doodles sits, I slowly shake my head. No Shore. No lifeguard. No dress. No Gary. No love. No point in going on. 

At once I'm reliving that horrible moment with Gary all over again. "Michelle?" I said to him. "You want to go out with Michelle? She's at least nineteen." 

"There's something about an older woman," Gary said and he turned the color of pink lemonade. 

"What about before?" I said, my words coming out too fast, too breathless. "You wanted to tell me something before when we were by Planet Smoothie." 

He rubbed his chin. "Oh yeah. That. Turns out, after my week away at basketball camp, I'm working at the Y as a summer counselor. So we won't be able to hang together as much as you'd hoped." 

"As I'd hoped?" 

"Yeah. You know. You keep talking about us spending lots of time together." 

I stood there frozen, like some storefront mannequin, only in crappy everyday clothes. And I realized just how right Megan was. I waited too long. I'm always waiting like some pathetic passive loser destined to spend the rest of her days alone and unloved. 

After one long horrible moment, I turned on my heel and left, tears filling my eyes. 

"Sang?" Mom says now. "You okay?" 

I ward off a fresh batch of tears by breathing deeply and blinking fast. "Yeah. Perfect." 

"Oh, honey," Mom says, squatting in front of me. "It's the swim lessons, isn't it? I know how you feel about swimming, but these lessons are an opportunity to overcome your fears. Don't you want to learn how to swim?" 

I shake my head. 

"Sweetheart, it's a safety issue." Mom touches my hand with her always chilly fingertips. "We want to protect you. What if someday you fall off a boat?" 

"So I won't go on a boat." I pull my hand away. "And I won't take swim lessons." 

Mom pats my knee and stands. "We'll talk about this later. Your father has something more to tell you all." 

God. What else? Cardboard bungalows for everyone? 

Dad clears his throat. "Right. Well, for one thing, we just found out we'll be having a visitor. Remember your cousin, Raina?" 

"Who's Raina?" Doodles asks. 

"You haven't met her yet," Mom says. "She wasn't in Delhi the last time we visited. But Sang, you should remember. Raina is the one you were so close to when you were little." When I give her a puzzled look, she says, "The one with the teeth. Remember?" 

I nod. At the time, Raina and I had had the same front teeth missing, and we would spit lime soda between our teeth into the little garden by Taoji Ravinder's building. The word 'taoji' means older brother uncle in Punjabi. My dad has two older brothers. Taoji Ravinder is my oldest uncle. He's also my favorite. 

"Mom had said spitting was unladylike," I tell Doodles, after explaining about the teeth. "But Taoji said we were planting more lime trees and to keep up the good work. Pretty soon me and Raina were 'planting' trees up and down the street." After I say this, I notice Dad staring out the window at nothing. "Dad, is Raina okay?" 

"Hmm?" He looks at me. "Fine. No problem. She'll be staying with us for a few weeks or so." 

"Wait," I say. "She isn't, you know?" I tap my forehead. 

"Now, I know last time we had someone stay with us, there were issues," Mom says. 

Understatement. During my sophomore year, Chachi spent a few months with us, but it felt like forever. She's my dad's sister-in-law and wife to his younger brother who had died a few years back. While she was here, Chachi stole money and food and set me up to take the blame. She was definitely not right in the head. 

"We want to assure you," Dad says carefully, "Raina is nothing like that. I honestly don't foresee any problems. So she will live here for a little while. Sound okay?" 

This is a typical Dad moment. He pretends like we have a choice in things and our opinions really matter. But this is the Jumnal house. If Dad decides my cousin is coming, then she is. Case closed. 

"Can I call Bethany now?" Doodles asks. 

"Well-" Mom begins. 

"Sure, go ahead," Dad says, and Doodles bursts out of the living room and tears up the stairs. 

"But, Akash," Mom says. 

"All done." Dad claps his hands. "Class dismissed." Hari and I stand. 

"Akash," Mom says, "you have to tell-" 

"Right right," Dad says. "Sangeet, you'll have to share your room with Raina. That's it." 

Okay, I'm not wild about this idea. But as usual, I don't have a choice. "Whatever you say, Dad." 

"That's a good girl," he says.

*****

"We know it's money trouble," Hari says, tossing a balled-up sock in the air and catching it. We're both sitting on his bed. After the family meeting ended, Hari and I immediately gravitated up to his attic bedroom to figure things out. 

"But we've never had this type of problem before," I say. My eyes wander around the room, taking in Hari's laptop on his desk, and his sci-fi paperbacks and creepy green hand coin-snatching bank on the shelf. This room once harbored Chachi, but she is long gone, Hari is here, and all should be right in the world. But it isn't now, is it? "What's different now?" 

Hari tosses the sock again and catches it. "Me. College. The expenses are too much." 

I sit up. "But you got loans. Scholarships." 

"Not enough. Mom and Dad pay. A lot." He throws the sock into his overflowing laundry basket. "Why didn't they say something?" He stands hands on hips and stares out the window at our little fenced backyard. 

Now I'm thinking about Dad's face. He looked really miserable. "Hari, what if we're in real trouble?" 

"We couldn't be. They didn't even bother me about getting a summer job yet." 

"True. And Raina's coming. We wouldn't exactly be having a houseguest if we were losing our house, right?" Hari doesn't answer. "Hari?" 

His stubbly jaw juts out and I can tell he's just made up his mind about something. My dad does the very same thing. Hari grabs his keys from the dresser top. 

"Where are you going?" I ask. 

"To get a job-where else?" 

As he races down the stairs to save the day, I shout, "Try Coffee and Cream!" 

After I hear the front door of the house slam, I grab a quarter from his nightstand and stick it in the coin bank's slot. There's a grinding noise as the green hand lifts higher, higher, then snatches that quarter away into the depths of the box. This bank used to crack me up. 

Today it doesn't seem funny at all.