Lying by Omission

Why is this all she wants to do with me when we talked for three hours the night we first met? Ilan had wracked his brain for weeks as to whether he'd done something wrong enough to render himself undateable, but he couldn't help but circle back to the same conclusions.

"Break it down logically," his sister, Anandi, had advised him over the Christmas break while they were eating candy in her childhood bedroom like they'd done growing up. "It could be she really doesn't want a relationship--in which case she's not going to date you. It could be that she doesn't want a relationship with you--in which case sleeping with her is not going to change her mind."

"But we're on the same wavelength," he rationalised to his sister shaking her head as she ripped open another fun-size Smarties pack.

"According to you," Anandi countered. "Whatever wavelength you think you're on, it's not enough for her." She gave him all the blue Smarties, like she'd always done. "And quite honestly, I'm pissed at this girl.

"She's stringing you along and wasting time that you could be spending with an actual girlfriend. Ilan, have some respect for yourself and recognise that you're not the kind of person who can have casual sex without regretting it."

His sister's words echoed in his head as he stared at Nyssa's ceiling until she came out of the bathroom and lay back on her bedspread. After he cleaned up and emerged, he simply spit out the words without trying to fashion a tactful sentence.

"This is my last time here," he stated. Nyssa sat up in surprise, an eyebrow arched, as Ilan barreled on. "I can't stay friends with you if this is all you want from me. And it was a mistake to think I could."

"Can we... can we still hang out together at the pub? Or study together?" she tried, knowing her 'solution' to not dating Ilan had monumentally messed up any semblance of the friendly relationship they'd had.

"Um, no," he replied. "Not for a while. I just... I just need some space, Nyssa."

He was moody for the next two weeks, she noticed, and went out of his way to avoid her at their usual haunts. Nyssa was dumbfounded at how she'd managed to go through a break-up with him despite never having dated him in the first place.

But after one mid-January weekend, Nyssa wondered if it was just her imagination that he came back from his parents' house with a spring in his step. After talking to a mutual friend, she learned he'd met Priya that weekend during the Tamil harvest festival of Pongal at their temple.

Nyssa wanted to drink her feelings but instead she went back home to Oakville like she'd originally planned that Friday afternoon.

"Look, I know they try to make themselves look progressive, but those Muslims are the most backward people in this country," her dad argued at dinner that night. "They're all against abortion and gay marriage."

"Dad, you're against abortion and gay marriage," Nyssa said, her patience for her father's bigotry hanging by a single thread.

"There's a difference," he defended himself. "That's my own independent thinking; it's not because I'm a Christian."

"Could it be because you're a misogynistic homophobe?" Nyssa coolly questioned. She looked around the table at the pairs of eyes that stared back at her during the pin-drop silence that ensued--her parents, her two younger brothers, and her uncle. But now she was going for broke.

"Or could it be that you're a racist, misogynist homophobe, not to mention a run-of-the-mill asshole?"

"Nyssa Elizabeth Gallagher!" her mother chastised her.

"Which one is it, dad?" Nyssa demanded. She was still raw from ruining everything with Ilan, despite knowing she never had a chance at a long-term relationship with him. And the people she was defiantly staring down at that kitchen table were the reason.

"It's whichever one is paying for you to go to that fancy law school of yours," her father said quietly.

"Just what I thought," she scoffed. "But guess what? The math has changed since the last time we had this conversation. I checked again, and it looks like I'm eligible for student loans now."

"The interest on those is ludicrous," her mother interjected.

"As a criminal defense lawyer, I'll be able to pay down the principal faster than most people," Nyssa explained. "And really, the interest is nothing compared to the freedom of no longer being beholden to you racists."

"You Marxists throw that word around like confetti!" her uncle boomed.

"Haven't you found a job yet, you freeloader?" Nyssa crisply bit off. "Or are you just going to live in your brother's house forever?" she gestured around the room. Nyssa's brothers held their forks frozen in mid-air, dumbfounded that their typically calm and controlled elder sister was going off the rails.

"What's gotten into you, Nyssa?" her mother asked.

"What should have gotten into me years ago," Nyssa answered. "I couldn't introduce you to my Asian friends in high school because I knew your dumbass husband would make some crack about how they're bad drivers. You humiliated me in front of Josephine a few months ago and jeopardized our friendship." She stood up and threw her napkin on the table.

"I wanted to come out of school debt-free but I'm ashamed of how I whored myself out to your sick principles. I should have said something a long time ago but I didn't because I believed your shit about family sticking together. I lost so much because I caved to you." She briefly thought about Ilan and willed her voice not to shake.

"Stephen, Noah, as long as you never turn into these bigots, I will always be there for you," she said to her teenage brothers. "The rest of you fuckers are out of my life."

***Present day***

It was ironic that Josephine had predicted all those years ago that Ilan was trying to stay single, considering Nyssa was the one who'd remained unattached since they finished their education and went their separate ways.

Although they both hailed from the Greater Toronto Area, Nyssa thought the odds of her and Ilan working together in the same little Oakville courthouse were astronomical--especially when Ilan was from Scarborough and his family lived closer to the massive Toronto courthouses looming virtually next door.

Nyssa had articled for a major firm downtown where she was run ragged and told it would only be for a few more years. Once she'd had a few trial wins under her belt, she could raise her hourly rates and send paralegals into court for piddly matters.

It took a year of following her firm's lawyers from courthouse to courthouse before Nyssa understood quite staunchly she didn't want that hectic life regardless of what it paid. She finished her time at the firm, respectfully turned down the junior position they offered her, and applied for a job at Legal Aid Ontario.

It was strange living in the same town as her entire family, yet not seeing most of them in six years, she thought while sitting alone at the Pita Pit during lunch. Stephen and Noah had texted her after that last supper to tell her they were proud of her and couldn't wait to leave that house.

As she unwrapped her lunch, she thought about how happy she was to have been able to put each of them through school with her savings. Pondering the next time she was due to meet her brothers for dinner, she was about to sink her teeth into her falafel when she heard her fellow duty counsel's voice.

"You're hogging a table all to yourself in this crowd?" Kai Te'kao chided her in his strong New Zealand drawl. Nyssa held back on her bite and put her falafel down.

"You're getting here a whole 15 minutes into the lunch hour?" she asked him back. "You know it's standing room only at this point."

"Well, thanks for inviting us, of course we'll sit with you," Kai grinned before motioning someone else over. It just happened to be the last person Nyssa wanted to see.

"I'm usually the first guy gone for lunch, but it was matter of pleading down a case or running a godforsaken trial on it," Ilan said, slipping into the seat beside her. "But I'm glad we ran into you so I can tell you both at the same time how the double baby mama case went."

"What." Kai let the word hang in the air like its own sentence before Ilan filled him in on the bail hearing Nyssa had left earlier.

"So then it was like shooting fish in a barrel," he concluded while Kai was still in stitches. "Both his potential sureties were clawing each other's eyes out and were taken into custody so he had no one to post bond for him. Dude's back in the cells until his mom can come get him tomorrow."

"This right here is why it makes no sense to regulate women's bodies," Kai said. "They can only have one pregnancy a year, at most. This guy could go out and get several women pregnant every day until we finally reach a plea deal or a trial date."

"The way he's going, he probably will," Ilan laughed. Then he finally noticed Nyssa hadn't said a word.

"Look, don't feel embarrassed for not knowing about baby mama number two," he told her, clueless that she was actually rampant with jealousy and regret that the one who'd gotten away was now engaged to another woman. "He probably wasn't even going to tell baby mama number one about her, let alone the court."

"Ten bucks says his plan was to make both kids think they were cousins while never letting the women be in the same room together," Kai offered. Ilan tried to quell his laughs since there was a chunk of falafel in his mouth.

"That sounds like something a six-year-old would come up with," he replied after swallowing. "First, I'll take the helicopter out of the box, then attach the blades, then it'll fly me to Africa and back home again before dinner." The two men guffawed until Ilan got up to wash his hands.

"I had a bit of an ulterior motive in sitting here," Kai told Nyssa when they were alone. "Shinedown is doing a show in Hamilton next week and I'm looking for someone to go with me."

"Maybe JP Wagner's free," Nyssa said, trying to make it come off as a joke but wishing this conversation was not happening. She hated that she had been all but obsessed with Ilan over the last several years, hoping against hope that he and Priya would break up so she could get a second chance.

Move on, her brain told her. It was never meant to happen with Ilan and you're going to watch him marry another woman in a few months from now. Kai is smart and handsome and he obviously likes you. MOVE. ON.

"Seeing as how JP Wagner's 71 years old, I kinda get the feeling Shinedown would scare him," Kai smiled. "I was hoping you'd come with me?" Nyssa's heart sank but she didn't have the spoons to cobble together an eloquent excuse. And she sure as hell didn't want Kai to ask her out again the next time he had a chance.

"Kai, you're sweet and you deserve someone who's emotionally available," she said outright. "I'm not in the right headspace to date anyone. And that's not a reflection on you; I actually haven't dated anyone since law school."

"Wow, who hurt you, Nyss?" he asked, visibly mystified. She shook her head with a rueful half-smile.

"I did. I mean, I hurt him and it was a mistake I don't think I'll ever get over although he certainly has."

She thankfully got that last sentence out before Ilan joined them again, at which point Nyssa told them both she was going for a walk and would see them back at the courthouse later.

"Is she alright?" Ilan asked Kai after watching her walk away with her hands shoved in her pockets, apparently carrying the weight of the world on her back. Kai looked in her direction and shrugged, genuinely not knowing the answer.

"No clue, man," he said. "I was hoping she'd buck the trend but the prettiest women seem to have the worst issues." Then he turned the discussion toward the remaining cases on his list, telling Ilan he probably wasn't going to run any more bail hearings that day.

Ilan nodded as his friend gave him the rundown of their pending work, not being able to bring himself to ask Kai what he'd meant by 'the worst issues.'

***********

Turning the doorknob of his parents' house in the Scarborough neighbourhood of Malvern, Ilan sensed he'd be walking into a tornado. All he wanted after the day he'd just had was to go back to his apartment in Oakville where he lived during the week instead of driving an hour east. His fiancée was one of few people for whom he'd endure two hours of rush-hour traffic.

He wasn't wrong about the tornado, as Priya had samples of various items laid out all over the living room floor. As Ilan tried to quietly navigate his way into the kitchen, he noticed there were more people around that he didn't know as opposed to those he did. Priya was somewhere in the mix but he didn't attempt to look for her.

"Amma?" he called out to his mother as he tiptoed past the loud chatter in the dining room. Malathi Shivanesan poked her head out from behind the wall separating her from where her son stood, her face lighting up when she spotted him.

"Did you drive all this way from Oakville at this hour?" she asked him in Tamil.

"Priya called me," he replied in English, as was his and Anandi's habit since they were toddlers. He hated that they didn't have active fluency in their mothertongue, but their preschool teachers had told their parents the kids would never learn proper English if they kept speaking 'their' language at home. He was grateful he could at least still understand Tamil.

"Why is all this happening here?" he asked his mother, glad to sneak in a few minutes unnoticed before his fiancée discovered he was home.

"I offered Priya the house," Malathi replied, stirring the pot of sambar on the stove. The aroma of the heavy lentil stew reminded Ilan of cozy winter nights curling up with a book after dinner. "She said there wasn't enough room at her apartment to spread out all the... things... for the wedding, and I said there's plenty of room here."

"So she just had a whole team descend on this place today?" Ilan frowned, wondering if his parents knew the extent to which they'd have their house occupied.

"No, no, it's okay," Malathi knew since Ilan was a baby that it was time to de-escalate when his eyebrows narrowed. "It's just me and Appa here now, and sometimes Anandi when she comes over with the baby."

"What if Appa trips over something?" Ilan remembered his dad's bad knees. "And Divya is learning to crawl now. Is all of that stuff on the floor over there supposed to remain untouched?" Malathi gave him a sheepish look as she reached over to let the accumulating steam out of the rice cooker before it bubbled over and burned onto the stovetop.

"Hey, I thought I heard your voice!" Priya excitedly hugged Ilan upon walking into the dining room. "Now you know why I called you here instead of to my place."

"You know, I think it should be your place," he replied after a short hug back. "Unless you're packing up all those flowers and vases and samples today." Malathi disappeared back into the kitchen to avoid what she anticipated was coming.

"But your mom said--"

"Does she know any of these people?" Ilan interjected. Priya blinked at him. "If I asked her what their names were, could she tell me?" he specified.

"Well, I don't know if your mom would remember, but I certainly introduced everyone to her," Priya answered. "It'll only be a few days until we decide, and then order the centerpieces and chair covers for the reception. And it's okay if everything's not perfectly in place all that time."

"Anandi brings Divya over a couple of times a week," Ilan posed, trying to control himself from turning this discussion into a cross-exam. "What you're telling me is it's fine if the baby crawls on things, puts them out of order, throws them around the room...?"

"What?" Priya looked aghast. "What would Anandi be doing all that time?" Ilan tried not to look aghast, himself.

"Okay, so we've established it wouldn't be fine if everything's not perfectly in place," he stated. "Honey, I'm not saying this was a bad idea; I'm saying I don't want this wedding to impose on anyone else's life, least of all my elderly parents and my baby niece. Is there a way we can move all this wedding stuff? At least by tomorrow night?"

Priya looked thoughtful and then nodded. The wedding planners were only there for an hour afterward as they animatedly talked plans with Priya. Ilan parked himself in a corner recliner in case he was needed, but when he found he wasn't, he went upstairs to look for his father.

"Finally, you have the good sense to escape that madness," Jeganathan Shivanesan told him as he sat back against the headboard of his bed and paused the action movie he was watching. "Here, have a masala vadai," he offered, holding out a plate of fried, doughy mini-donuts to his son. Ilan savoured the salt and crispness, finally feeling like he was home despite being at the house for an hour.

"Appa," Ilan started. "How did you know Amma was the right one for you?" Jeganathan's eyes all but bugged out.

"I'm an old man now, my heart can't take this question," he rattled off in Tamil. Ilan burst out laughing.

"No, no, I mean... nobody dated back then, right? I know you met in school and it was a love marriage, and your parents got mad because you refused to have an arranged marriage."

"I don't remember half of what happened last month and you're asking me to go back 35 years?" Jeganathan now said in English.

"Appa, just listen and stop joking." All Ilan really wanted to do with his father was shoot the breeze and hear about how every neighbour on the street was an idiot in one way or another. But he had to get this out of the way first. "There were other girls in your school," he went on. "How did you know Amma was the right one?" Jeganathan sighed, as though he was trying to recall.

"She was my first friend," he finally said, recalling his school days in Sri Lanka. "And although I made more friends at that college, she was the best one. I didn't want to marry another girl and drift away from someone I could talk endlessly with."

While his simple statement hung in the air, Ilan could still hear the ambient noise of the hustle and bustle downstairs. Jeganathan didn't want to push, as he knew his son was much smarter than he'd ever been given the chance to become.

Instead, he simply unpaused his movie so they could both think in the racket of a forgettable action sequence. Ilan pulled out his phone, made a note in his calendar for the day after tomorrow, then put away the device and enjoyed the next two hours with his dad.

When his phone buzzed at lunch a couple of days later with a reminder, he called his mother.

"Hi Amma, Priya removed everything from the house, right? She said she would by last night." A few too many beats passed for Ilan's liking.

"Yes, ma, she did," his mom then said.

"Can you take a picture of the living room floor and send it to me?" As Ilan expected, there was a long sigh followed by his mother trying to placate him.

"This is your wedding!" she reasoned in Tamil. "This is our way to help and it won't be forever." Ilan sighed back.

"That's not the point, Amma."

***********

"Oh, thank god you actually showed up," Stephen Gallagher said after waving his sister down to the table where he and Noah were waiting. He hadn't known this restaurant existed at Trafalgar and Lakeshore in downtown Oakville, but Nyssa requested it when they asked her to dinner. "When you told us to meet you here, I thought we were going to be punked."

"And Sri Lankan food?" Noah added. "What's the difference between this and Indian?" Nyssa gave her youngest brother her best shockface.

"You know how you guys are always bragging about your alcohol tolerance? Well, I've been building up my heat tolerance. You're gonna know what the difference is between this and Indian when it burns going down."