The Hero Next Time: A Novel of the Terribly Acronymed Detective Club (Book 4)

Chapter Thirty-Three: Sunny, Summer, 1995

When Bishan married Balwinder, she did so with an IUD already inside her. Tej brought her to the obstetrician to have the procedure done, telling neither family about it. "She's marrying before she's ready," Tej explained, "and the last thing I want for your little sister is to be saddled with kids right away, especially if Balwinder's going to be on the road for days on end, unable to do his half of the parenting."

Sunny could have argued his mother would be on hand, but he kept his mouth shut. These were liberated times, at least according to TV. Dads were expected to change diapers and give late night feedings, and generally see to it the mother got her share of sleep and time to herself. Sunny fully expected to do so whenever they got around to having kids, which wasn't yet. Sunny was just so busy in the early stages of being a lawyer, first with articling long hours six days a week, then busting his ass as an associate, taking the shit cases no one else wanted, that he was almost too tired to have sex at the end of the night, whenever Tej wasn't already asleep, much less contemplate spending the hours after he got home being up with a teething kid.

For her part, Tej was in no hurry. She was still building her reputation as a realtor. She'd started out at Re/Max, but already she was grumbling at the trade-off of smaller commissions for being associated with a big name and getting more commissions. She was working a lot for little return, and wondering when she could go into business for herself. Sunny worried at the instability of such a venture, but he quietly encouraged her, and when she said she would be able to make her own hours that way and devote time to a family, suddenly the possibility of children became real.

Mom and Dad were certainly encouraging them. They wanted grandchildren as soon as possible, and the hope on their faces broke his heart. Tej stayed on the pill, keeping her prescription discreetly hidden in a drawer in their ensuite bathroom, away from his parents' prying eyes, while publicly lamenting that the creator just wasn't blessing them with children for now, but there was always next month, and the one after that, and so on...

Bishan didn't want the pill, because she didn't want to have to explain herself if Balwinder found it. An IUD was out of sight, beyond scrutiny, up where no one would discover it. When she was finally ready to have children, she would have it removed, discreetly, in the obstetrician's office. 

"Balwinder's a traditionalist," she explained once when they were alone together. "We're not having sex until our wedding night, and we're marrying to start a family, in theory anyway. I don't know if he's even done it before. What if he's terrible? I can't risk conception from terrible sex."

Sunny always marvelled at how openly his sister discussed the birds and the bees with him. What was it about him that made him so approachable in her eyes? He certainly never talked about his sex life with her. Still, he would rather she feel free to bring any problems she had to him, because he was still her older brother, still her protector.

"Do you think he'll know you're not a virgin?" he asked.

"I'm going to act like it's painful the first time," she said. "I'll cut myself somewhere discreet and make a little blood for the sheets."

"Jesus, Bishan! That's a little more than I needed to know."

She stuck her tongue out at him like she did when she was small.

"So," he said. "Do you miss Jordan?"

She shrugged. "We're still friends."

Sunny blinked in surprise. "What does that mean?"

"Just what I said. After he proposed at your wedding, I knew I'd have to make a choice soon, and his proposal made my choice easier. I didn't like how he did it there. It wasn't respectful to you or to me, and he could have caused a lot of damage. The fact that Mom and Dad were gracious enough to see past that and be receptive to me having him in my life actually made me resent him a little for putting them in that position."