A/N: New chapter time!
When I wrote this one, back in October, I thought by the time I publish I would have to make major changes, to replace my OC with whoever Raj's partner on the show would be. Yet here we are and still no potential partner for Raj, so he gets Anaya in this story.
Thanks again to all those who reviewed, favorited and followed. This means a lot to me and I enjoy reading your reviews so much. Thanks again to joyteach for beta reading and in this chpater also making it into Indian English.
Surprisingly, I still don't own even a scratch of The Big Bang Theory. That belongs to Lorre and Prady. I do own my 7 OCs and, to some extent, Halley and Michael who are not exactly characters on TBBT.
Chapter 4: Constant work
[Raj.]
My daughter Dakota and I worked hard on our presentation of the special science bowl for our friends. My friend Penny Hofstadter asked me to organise a special bowl for her daughter Riley's tenth birthday party. Science bowls were a regular thing for our group of four families, which included many scientists and science-loving kids. But Kotie and I both love our friends and love creating and hosting activities for them, and we wanted to make it extra spectacular.
We were doing a magnificent job, both "in the zone", hosting it "Ellen style" with clever jokes and kick-ass dance moves. My fairy princess was rocking it. She's definitely got her father's knack for dazzling the crowd. But then the electricity went off and on again in a second, and the whole thing was ruined. That was weird, we hadn't had blackouts for years.
Kotie was disappointed. We hadn't got to do our surprise pre-finale tap dance number. I told her we would work to make it even greater and use it for her sixth birthday next month. That seemed to do the trick, but to cheer ourselves up even more we decided to catch up with Halley Wolowitz, my twelve-year-old goddaughter and my best friends' Howard and Bernadette's daughter.
"Hello your majesty," I bowed.
"Hello godfather." Halley kissed my hand.
That was our usual greeting, my precious queen Halley deserved such respect and I could never get enough of "The Godfather" jokes.
"What' you doing Halley?" Kotie asked, her brown eyes twinkling like the diamond in her bob pin.
"I am looking at the new issue of 'Preteen Queen'," she said and switched her tablet so it projected on the kitchen island. "It has 10 pages on how to upgrade your school look."
Halley is the fashion queen of our group. Girl's got style to die for. Always trendy, always glamorous. I love shopping and talking fashion with her. Although Kotie's style is more "fairytale", being the fairy princess she is, she is fascinated by Halley's fashion and beauty tips too.
Bernadette would sometimes join our talks and shopping trips and so would Penny and her seven-year-old Sophie. There were a few times when Anaya and even our friend Amy Fowler and her three-year-old daughter Lizzie joined us as well. The only girl in the gang who never joined any of this was Riley. She hated everything fashion or beauty related. Her style was pretty much the same as her dad, Leonard's, when he was younger. That's a shame, as that girl is absolutely gorgeous. With her chocolate brown hair accentuating her big green eyes she is like a little girl version of actress Lucy Hale. Which reminds me how much I miss "Pretty Little Liars"! Vengeance, manipulations, romance - that show was one of my favorite treats for whenever Howard was not around.
"Wow cool I can't wait to be in school!" Kotie said after looking at some of the outfits.
"Preschool isn't too bad, you don't get homework and don't have all those tests and projects… But yeah school is pretty awesome, you get to make all those friends and have your posse to hang out with and do fun stuff with," Halley replied.
"American school social cliques do look fun," I interjected, "unless you're in the rejects' cliques. But things always turn around for them in the movies."
I think Halley smirked for a split second, maybe she helped one of the rejects climb up the social pyramid with new clothes and hairstyle? I didn't have time to ask her about it though, as I just received a phone call.
"Kotie it's Mummy!"
"Yay!"
My wife Anaya was currently in India as a tour guide for an Indian American family. She does that four to six times a year, depending on the length of the tour. She wouldn't be away for more than 12 weeks a year, as she has us and her main job here - running an Indian heritage center.
Although she was born in the United States, Anaya has always cared a lot about staying in touch with her Indian roots. She opened the center to help other Indian Americans do the same. The center has movie nights, dancing nights, music shows and lessons about Indian culture and history, as well as dancing and cooking lessons. A few years after she opened the center, her aunt opened an Indian restaurant just next to it, and a couple of years after that, one of her regular visitors opened an Indian clothing shop next to the restaurant, so it became a little Indian complex. When she told me about that I said it was probably great for revenue. She looked at me as if I said Sandra Bullock was "just all right". For her it is all about the heritage. Every penny she made that she didn't need for her basic needs and for sustaining the center, she used to develop it - get more workers, advertise, buy more equipment, invite more lecturers, arrange more special events.
I actually met Anaya in one of the center's events. Our story is just like a Rom-Com. It all started with me once again all bummed about not having a girlfriend. All of my friends were hanging with their partners and I was watching a rerun of "Sex and The Big City". Then, as if some "force majeure" triggered me, I decided to visit the local temple. I also ran out of ice cream and the temple was close to the supermarket. When I got out of the temple a young boy, who would later become my brother-in-law, handed me a leaflet. It was an advertisement for a lecture about matchmaking in the Indian culture that would take place the following night at "The Pasadena Indian Heritage Center". I never believed in matchmaking. I repeatedly turned down my parents' offers to set me up. But something made me go and hear about it. Howard says it was desperation. I prefer to think it was Kamedeva, the Hindu god of love.
You can probably guess the next part. I came to the lecture a little late, my dog Cinnamon wanted an extra five minutes of belly rubbing and I couldn't resist. I entered the room quietly and sat at the back, close to the door. I was so busy trying to avoid making a noise that I didn't even notice I sat next a woman. Only a couple of minutes later, when I heard the sweetest laugh I had ever heard, in response to the lecturer's joke, did I notice her. This cute, somewhat short woman with big brown eyes and raven hair, dressed in a red sari. We both turned and looked at each other for a few seconds. Since that moment and throughout the whole thing we would take quick glances at each other. I was so nervous, I was afraid my selective mutism, which rendered me unable to speak to women up until my early thirties, was coming back.
Fortunately, when the lecture was over and Anaya asked me what I thought about it, I was able to regain my composure. Or maybe I didn't regain it completely, as I just spoke my mind, honestly. But Anaya found my perspective interesting. She said she always felt conflicted about matchmaking. She was determined to respect her heritage, but at the same time felt one should make efforts to find a partner by oneself. I then told her I loved the way the room was decorated, explaining what made it work for me.
"You do know I run this place, right?" she asked. I felt my cheeks burning.
"Oh I'm so sorry I didn't know that."
"What are you sorry about? You complimented my design."
We both laughed at my awkwardness. I then looked at her, took a deep breath and went for it: "I-I'm Rajesh, by the way. I think I will be coming back here, but I would also like to meet you in a different place, like a coffee house or a restaurant, just the two of us. Would that be okay?"
She replied by taking my phone and entering her number. She then kissed me on my cheek, "Good night Rajesh."
A year later she told me she thought Rati, Kamedeva's female counterpart, had something to do with our meeting. Like me, Anaya is a true romantic.
As I accepted Anaya's video call, I called everyone, and all 15 of us quickly gathered in the Hofstadters' living room. It was a little weird at first because we were such a tight-knit group, but Anaya became part of the gang very quickly and everyone liked her. Even Sheldon Cooper, Amy's husband, alias "Doctor Wackadoodle", admitted that he found her "acceptable" after a few months.
I set my phone on a shelf so the camera would capture us all and set a 16 inch projection of Anaya's video stream in front of us.
"Hi everyone!" Anaya waved. She was wearing a green and pink sari. She didn't wear saris all the time, just for tours and at the center, although most of her regular clothes did have Indian symbols on them.
A choir of "Hello"s, "H"s and How are you?"s sounded.
"I am doing great, but I miss you guys so much, especially my dear family. I'm really sorry I couldn't be there for your birthday party, Riley."
"That's okay Aunt Anaya, you were at every birthday party I had before and I will have many more you can come to," Riley smiled, her tone and expression just like her mum's when comforting someone. She has always been incredibly compassionate and forgiving.
"Mummy Mummy me and Daddy hosted the science bowl! It was off the hook!" Kotie jumped and got closer to the projection.
"Wow sugar! I'm sure you did a fantastic job!"
"Indeed, Kotie was phenomenal!" I said, beaming at my daughter, who turned to me.
Kotie grinned and then turned back, "But then there was a power close."
"Power outage," Sheldon corrected.
"Really? That's unusual," Anaya said.
"Yeah it doesn't happen for years and then it happens today. Awesome, huh?" Penny murmured.
"Honey, are you okay?" Leonard asked, rubbing her back a little.
"Yes, I'm fine. Everything is fine," she quickly replied.
Leonard's hesitant "Okay" was our sign to get back to Anaya. Being with Penny for years, he knew when continuing to question her might end up pushing her away.
"Okay guys I'll let you get back to the party. Raj, Kit-Kotie, I will call you again later. Riley darling, have an awesome birthday! I wish you the best. I believe in you, when you really want something, you work for it."
That was a very Anaya thing to say. "Work for it" was like her motto. Anaya came from a poor family. Her parents immigrated to the US two years before she was born. Getting here was very complicated in itself, but life did not take a dramatic turn for the better when they finally immigrated. They both worked as drivers for her uncle's taxi service. They had four children, worked long hours, and earned peanuts. Anaya started working at 14. First as a waitress, then as a cook. All the members of her family combined their salaries to meet their basic needs. As the children grew up, each finally managed to become independent. Anaya couldn't even dream about going to college, so after graduating from high school she started working almost 24/7. She knew how to keep her expenses low, so she had accumulated money. At 28, she finally had enough money to open her center and be able to take the risk of it crashing down.
When I met Anaya she was 36. Her center had a decent amount of classes, activities and events, but she aspired to do so much more. When she talked about her aspirations for the center, I thought doing "The Secret Millionaire" bit would be a great continuation of our magical story. So I didn't mention coming from a rich family. I told her my father owned a soup restaurant and that our family did fair enough. I told her I got to the university thanks to a scholarship. A couple of weeks later, I wrote her a cheque for more than 10 times the amount her center made in a year, courtesy of my father.
That's when our story stopped being this magnificent Rom-Com. Anaya was furious. She tore up the cheque immediately. She was furious both that I lied about my identity, and that I thought I could just give her money and everything would be perfect. I was devastated. But instead of crying at home for days, I decided to work for it. I went to Anaya's building every day after work and sat there until midnight. For the first three days she wouldn't even look at me. She quickly walked into the building, not giving me a chance to say more than one word. Then, on the fourth day, she stopped at the door and turned around. I then told her how sorry I was, that it was all my fault, and that I had been stupid and had discounted her feelings.
That was true not only for my treatment of Anaya, but also for my treatment of many women I had dated. As soon as I started dating a girl, I would assume she should feel the same way I did. I would be insensitive to her feelings. I would pressure her, or make her uncomfortable in some other way. I would just assume that now that I had the girl, our relationship should go the way I wanted it to, and without my having to do much for it. I would not work for it.
For me, life was obtaining what I wanted, and then enjoying it. For Anaya, life was working to achieve, maintain and develop what she wanted. When I came back home after the cheque incident and thought about her, I realized that if I wanted to be in a relationship with her, I had to work for it. Being in a relationship meant constant work. I was willing to work for Anaya, and decided to show it to her. Luckily for me, she was willing to work for me too. She said she never shied away from hard work, and that she thought she could handle me. That was one of the most wonderful moments of my life.
After saying goodbye to Anaya and hanging up the phone, we all got back to conversation and snack eating. I'd just got back from the snack table, when I heard a little voice coming from the floor.
"Uncle Raj, do you know where my Daddy is?" I looked down at the Hofstadters' three-year-old, Maxi. He looked quite serious, frowning like his dad does when concentrating. This expression seems to be as highly hereditary as Leonard's high intelligence, as both traits have been passed down to all of his children.
"I think he is helping your mommy organize something. Is there anything I can do for you?"
"I think so," he nodded. "Uncle Raj, you are married. Can you tell me what should one do to be good at marriage?"
"Uh… Let me see… I'd say respect her wishes. Yeah that's a good one. Respect her wishes."
Maxi nodded, still looking very serious.
"Why do you-"
I couldn't finish my sentence, as I felt Kotie tugging at my sleeve from behind me. As I turned around, Maxi went away.
"Daddy, can I get a Shana Lane dress? Halley says she is the top designer for girls!"
"Sure sweetheart! How about we go shopping on Monday?"
"Yay! Thank you thank you Daddy you're the best!" Kotie hugged me.
I love making my girl happy. I'll just have to remove the tag before Anaya comes back. She doesn't like it when I buy Kotie expensive stuff. But what can I do? Growing up, my parents bought me everything I wanted. So what if people say I pamper her? I want my treasure to know her daddy loves her!
Suddenly all the lights went off, this time not for a second. An emergency light in the middle of the living room went on.
"Daddy what is happening?" Kotie asked. I could hear other children asking the same.
"There seems to be a black out, a temporary shortage of electricity," Leonard explained.
Penny started murmuring again, "Would you look at that! First the bowl is ruined and now we don't get to even start the picture presentation, all the birthday wishes videos and the "guess what Riley made out of that?" quiz! Funny huh? How everything turned around like that..."
