The Patient Sikh: Part Fifteen--The Dress

The Indian Association at the University is having a dance. I want to take Sonny. I know, I know, he has a girlfriend number one. I am not his girlfriend number two. I love him, number three. He doesn't love me, number four. I hate counting.

Maybe I could get him to go just as friends. Maybe we could be like we were before, good friends. Comrades. Buddies.

What would I say? 'Hey old buddy ole pal, wanna go to a dance with me? Don't worry I don't love you, I promise.'

I'm such an idiot. But I decide to go to on a bus to a dress store to find the perfect dress. I find that long dresses don't flatter me because my belly sticks out. Shorter dresses are better, I find this black dress with a lace border. It's very form fitting. Perfect, I think.

Everything is solved now that I have a dress. Sometimes I think in life that all is necessary is the perfect outfit. I have to call Sonny again. I'm getting sick of these dramatic phone calls. The thought of them is more dramatic than the actual conversations.

Now that I have a dress, I feel it is imperative that I go that dance with Sonny. How am I going to manage that? I'll call him and say we should 'all' meaning our friends and I, should go to the dance together. I won't talk about in terms of a date or us going together. I will just slyly hang out next to him the entire night.

So I call him and convince him to bring a couple of friends and that we should all go to the dance together. The only worry I have is that he will bring his girlfriend. Gawd! How do I stop him from doing that?

Fast forward to the night of the dance. I had bought a bunch of tickets for everyone. It turns out he didn't bring her. I have no idea why not. Maybe they are not doing well together. Maybe they are over. Maybe I can hope for all these things.

Sonny brings his best friend Jaz who is kind of a snake. I can't stand him. He is so not worthy of Sonny. So we are just hanging out at the pink punch bowl table at the dance. I'm standing next to Sonny as I had hoped. I don't dance, he doesn't dance. What was the whole point of this again?

The dress. Oh yeah, I needed him to see me in this dress. "You look nice," he says as he takes a sip of the creamy punch. I don't know how to respond. What do I say? He is wearing a suit, he looks pretty good himself. But I can't tell him he looks good after he tells me I look good. So lame.

"Thank you," I say thinking that is such an unoriginal phrase. Why can't I be cooler? But the point is he actually noticed me in this dress.

"You wanna go outside and take a walk?" he asks and I almost fall to the floor. Is this really happening?

"Yeah," I say trying to sound casual. We walk down the long hallway in the ballroom and get our coats. It's pretty chilly outside on this November day. He helps me put my black coat on. I want to scream. I can't believe this is happening.

My hair is up in a bun, and I keep contemplating whether he would think it was sexier if it was down. Whatever, we are going on a walk. At night. Alone. The world and life is good.

When we get a little farther down the sidewalk he pulls out a joint. I never knew he smoked weed. Is this why he wanted to go outside? "You want some?" he asks and takes a hit.

"Yeah sure," I say trying to sound like I am cool with it. I've never smoked pot before. I'm a little nervous. I try to inhale it as the smoke puffs up all around us. All of a sudden I start coughing.

"Are you OK?" he asks and puts his hand on my back. "Have you ever done this before?" he asks as I try to regain my composure.

"Actually no," I say trying not to sound like I'm some kind of nerd or square or something. He puts his hand on my hair for a second.

"It's OK, take it easy," he says and I he looks me right in the eyes. For a moment the whole world stopped spinning. Nothing else was happening but this moment, where we looked into each other's eyes.

He leaned in and kissed me. I don't really know how to kiss if I must be honest. But nothing, nothing in life so far, has felt this good. Our tounges touch for a second and I can feel this electricity running through my entire body.

He pulls away. I don't know now what to say. He doesn't know what to say. He takes another puff of his joint and I just stare at him. I cannot comprehend that this is happening. I don't understand if the stars have aligned finally in my favor. Maybe god is finally on my side.