Page 203 of Snap Shot

“Who?”

“Never mind.” A light hand slaps my arm. “I didn't mean get married right thissecond, silly. I meant a year from now or, like, sometime in the future…”

I look back at her with confused eyebrows. “Youwantto get married?”

The air stills. “Why wouldn't I?”

“You made it sound like it was the worst idea you'd ever heard.”

“I don't wanna get married to someone they plucked from a giant book curated by a Seema Aunty-knockoff. I wanna be able to tell them about…”

Fuck. I've read this all wrong. “Indi.” I swallow, bracing my next breath. “I don't wanna get married, like,ever.”

Her hold on me stiffens and recedes. “You're serious?”

“I don't see the point.”

“The point?” She backpedals and unties her robe, distracting me with all that flawless brown skin. “You? The King of Grand-Romantic-Gestures, Mister I-Love-Love himself, doesn't believe in marriage?”

“What does that” —I lose my train of thought before her nakedness disappears under flannel pajamas— “have to do with anything? Marriage and love aren't exclusive. You can have one without the other. I learned that from my parents.”

“AndIlearned from mine that love is the foundation of a good marriage.” The backs of her knees hit the edge of the mattress and she sighs through her nose, drawing her hands together in her lap.

This is not going great. But she's reasonable. Maybe she'll hear me out.

I scramble into a pair of loose pajama pants while eyeing her nervous hand-wringing. Me kneeling between her legs doesn't seem to relax or sway her. “Just because it works one way for some—”

“Of course not! This isn't a judgment about how others want to live.” Her eyes scrunch closed and re-open, exasperated. “How many times have we watched fictional brown people sing and dance or cry and fight their way to a mandap?”

More than I have fingers to count. And yet, this is the first time I've considered what it represents for her.

“My parents have that Bollywood, only-in-the-movies sort of marriage,” she continues. “I've seen it all my life.” Her glossy gaze punches my heart. “I might not be sure of anything else right now, but I know I want to get married.” That low voice of hers drops to a whisper. “I thought you knew.”

Carpet scratching my knees, I inch forward. “I thought you knew too. I told you about Sierra.”

“I assumed you were too young or whatever.”

My head drops into her lap to nudge kisses onto her hands. “I was.”

They bloom open as she holds my face upright. “You loved her, eh?”

“Sure, I did. As much of what I understood love to be. There was other stuff going on, too. I had gotten drafted. Sierra was ready to move on and I wasn't. But you” —I latch onto her by the hips, bunching the loose fabric— “this. Us. It's right.” My throat tenses through a painful gulp. “I love you—”

The contrast of her thumb's comforting stroke against the anguish growing in her eyes cuts off my words. She nods. “You love me, but not enough to marry me.”

“Indi.” I pull at her. “It's not like that. I don't want to marryanyone.”

Glazed brown eyes plead back. “Why?”

The question has me tugging a frustrated hand through my hair. “Because!”

Indi flinches at the raised volume but maintains her position.

“Because what happens one day and one of us decides we're not in love and don't wanna be together anymore? My dad—”

“That's different, Landon.”

“The result was the same.” A complicated divorce left my father suddenly with a new lease on life while Mom bore the brunt of responsibility. She never remarried,hell, she never dated. And how could she? Two kids, a demanding job, and a failed marriage with a man she continued to live with wasn't exactly the stuff of dating dreams.

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