Professor Astor (Off-Limits)

“You ready to go, sweetheart?” Mom asks, her head popping into my room. There’s concern in her voice that she tries to hide behind a smile, but I know my mother well enough to see through it.

“Yes, Mom,” I tell her, pasting a reassuring smile onto my face, even though my heart is racing, a familiar ache spreading with each heartbeat. I grab my favorite handbag with fingers that tremble just slightly, tightening my grip around the luxurious leather straps as I lift it onto my shoulder.

“Can you believe Asha was in labor for fourteen hours? That’s not something you ever want to experience,” Mom says, her voice high-pitched, the way it always is when she’s rambling. “It’ll take her months to recover from that, you know? Pregnancy is so hard on women.”

I nod and smile, swallowing down my misery. The truth is that I do want to be in labor for fourteen hours. Hell, I’ll happily breathe through three full days of labor if it means I get to have a child of my own.

Mom often does this. She tries to downplay the significance of having children, as though that’ll make me want them less. She’ll take my sister as an example of how tired I’d be, how hard it is, and how many things I’d have to sacrifice. Her intentions are good, they always are, but she fails to realize that I want all the bad right along with the good.

“Sounds awful,” I tell her absentmindedly, and she smiles shakily, a hint of relief in her eyes. Sometimes I wonder if her attempts to console me are more for her own benefit. I bite down on my lip and shake my head slightly, berating myself for my thoughts.

It’s not my mother’s fault I had ovarian cancer in my teens, and it definitely isn’t her fault I developed primary ovarian insufficiency from the chemo, rendering me as good as infertile. I know she’s as heartbroken as I am, but it doesn’t make her attempts to console me feel any better. It’s pity at its finest, and I hate being pitied.

“There you two are,” Dad says, his expression as blank as it always is. “Let’s go. Always late, we are,” he grumbles in his best Yoda impression, his attempt to lighten the mood. I force a smile for his benefit as I follow him to the car.

I’m quiet as we drive to my sister’s house, wishing I could’ve made an excuse not to go. I desperately wanted to stay home, but I know that if I’d done that, Mom would’ve worried about me.

I’m overcome with dread as we park in front of Asha’s house. Somehow I don’t mind children when they aren’t family. I have no problem working as a nanny for my sister’s business, but when someone close to me has a baby, it hits me hard. It doesn’t help that my mother watches me closely at the mere mention of anyone in the family having a child, which these days seems to be every few months. I’m so scared of her hurting on my behalf, yet I’m also tired of hurting in silence.

Mom clutches the gifts she brought Asha to her chest as we walk up to the front door, her eyes beaming with excitement. I wonder what she’d be like if I ever had a child of my own. I wish I could be at the receiving end of her joy someday.

“Mom, Dad,” Rohan, my sister’s husband, says as he opens the door. His smile widens when his eyes land on me. “Leia! Asha is going to be so happy to see you.”

He offers each of us a hug as he ushers us in, and I grin when I notice the milk stains on his t-shirt. Looks like they haven’t had an easy time since the baby’s birth.

Rohan leads us into their living room, where Asha is seated with the baby in her arms, their two-year-old son, Rohit, next to her, iPad in hand. Asha looks up, her eyes lighting up when she sees me. “Leia!”

I grin and grab some hand sanitizer from the coffee table before sitting down beside her. She’s trying to console her baby daughter who won’t stop crying, and the sounds of the baby’s soft sobs tug at my heartstrings. “How have you been?” I ask, pressing a kiss to my sister’s cheek.

She sighs and shakes her head, her eyes briefly lifting to our mother who is making her way to Asha’s kitchen, while my dad stands in the corner, chatting to Rohan. “I’m tired,” she murmurs. “The feedings are driving me crazy, and she just cries so much, Ley. Please tell me you’re okay to take over from me at work,” she says, referring to the highly exclusive nanny business she’s been running for years now. Her waiting lists are years long, and her clients are some of the richest people in the country. I get why she’s worried, but I know her company as well as she does, and I’m certain I can handle it just fine.

“Of course. You know I’ve got this. Don’t you worry. The company won’t fall apart while you’re on maternity leave, I promise you.” I hold my arms out, and Asha smiles as she hands me the baby. My heart skips a beat as I place the baby on my chest. “Hi, Nalini,” I whisper, patting her back.

“Oh my, she stopped crying,” Asha whispers, the relief in her voice palpable. I grin, my heart overflowing with equal parts need and happiness. “You’re so great with children, Ley. Once you have some of your own, you’ll put us all to shame. I have a feeling you’re going to be one of those annoying perfect supermoms with perfectly behaved annoying little children.”

I chuckle, even as my heart skips a beat. I glance at my sister and smile. She knows how low my chances of ever having children are, yet she has so much faith. I wish I could borrow some of it every once in a while. “I’d have to find a husband first,” I say, knowing that that’s not something I’ll ever do. Even if I wanted to, most of the men in our community would never accept me. We might be living in modern times, but in our culture, too much is still far too backward.

“I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that,” Asha says, her tone careful. “Rohan has a really nice colleague that I think you should meet. He’s incredibly kind, and he’s an accountant.”

I tense, unsure what to say. The older I get, the more often family members try to introduce me to someone, and I hate it.

“You’re twenty-nine, Leia. You can’t stay single all your life. You have so much love to give, so much left to experience. Just grab a coffee with him, okay? I’ll text him your number.”

I swallow hard, unable to form a reply. “I’m just focusing on finishing my PhD,” I tell her eventually.

Asha sighs. “You’ve been doing that PhD of yours for years now. You’re hiding behind it, and don’t even try to deny it. You’ve been using it as an excuse not to live your life, and I’m not going to let you keep that up. I love you, Ley. You deserve the world, but you can’t have it if you hide yourself away.”

The baby squirms in my arms, and my heart shatters as I blink away my tears. I want to scream at Asha, tell her that I wish I could have everything she wants for me, that I’d want nothing more than to be happily married with children of my own, but it isn’t that simple. Something like this isn’t reserved for everyone. She knows about the medical issues I’ve been dealing with, the hormone replacement therapy, the endless supplements. Despite that, she never lost faith. There’s no use trying to talk any sense into her. My big sister is adamant that I’ll be a mother someday, but it just isn’t that simple.

Nalini starts to cry, and I hand her back to her mother instead of consoling her. Asha takes Nalini from me, but her eyes never leave mine.

“Leia,” she murmurs, but I don’t turn to look at her.

“I’ve got some data I need to analyze tonight, Asha. I’d better get going,” I murmur as I rise to my feet.

“Leia!” she repeats. “Don’t go, okay? I won’t rishta you again,” she says, using the word we’ve come to replace the word matchmaking with.

“Where are you going, Leia?” Dad asks, a hint of concern in her eyes.

I smile at him as brightly as I can. “Sorry, Dad. I’ve got to get back to school. I’m so sorry, but I completely forgot about something I had to finalize tonight. I’ve just been so busy that it slipped my mind.”

He falls silent, as though he’s seeing straight through me. “Do you want me to drop you off at the college?” he asks, his voice soft.

I shake my head and head to the door. “Amara is picking me up,” I say, lying and using my best friend as an excuse. “I’ll see you tonight, okay?”

Dad nods, and for a moment I’m scared he’ll insist on walking me to the door and seeing me off. He adores Amara, and he usually loves seeing her, so I wouldn’t put it past him. Thankfully, Rohan distracts him, and I slip past him before he can change his mind.

The door closes behind me, and I take a deep breath, oxygen filling my lungs as though I’ve been suffocating. I glance back at the door and walk away before anyone sees me standing here, my thoughts reeling as I walk through the unfamiliar neighborhood.

My emotions are all over the place tonight. I thought I was stronger than I am, and I can’t help but feel disappointed in myself. I thought I’d accepted the future I’m heading toward, but Asha reopened old wounds.

I take a deep breath and pause by the bar in the corner. I should know better than drinking away my sorrows, but I’m weak tonight.