Silently Falling in Love: Lucky Charm THIS IS THE EDITED VERSION

Chapter 19 - Cha-cha

Sitting in the bar, I wondered why we couldn't go anywhere without a TV these days. Everywhere you went there was a TV – the bank, restaurants, gas stations, and even at a five-star hotel there was a damn TV in the lobby. I tried to avoid being drawn into whatever was playing on the TV. I yelled at the kids and Alex whenever we went to dinner and they became engrossed with whatever was playing on TV rather than spending time as a family.

I made it my personal challenge to ignore the TVs surrounding me. But Cheryl Burke was dancing on Dancing with the Stars. I succumbed and sat back in my seat and watched her and her partner glide across the dance floors. After her performance, I couldn't help but smile. It was a beautiful performance of the cha-cha. No wonder she was a two-time winner.

I smiled as I heard the judges commenting on her performance of the cha-cha. If my kids were watching, they would laugh and making some silly joke on the word cha-cha and how it could mean a dance in English and uncle in Hindi. They loved making silly jokes and playing off words between the two languages. They would have come up with something like "My cha-cha loves to cha-cha!" I knew it was juvenile, but it made me laugh no matter how corny the jokes were. Although, in this case their cha-cha, Arjun really loved to cha-cha.

Between the corny cha-cha joke running through my head and thinking about my father-in-law my mind wandered to the other father figure in Alex's life, Tarun cha-cha. Jatin may have been Alex's biological father, but Tarun cha-cha was the father he looked to. There was a bond between him and cha-cha that wasn't there between him and his own father.

Tarun cha-cha was the reason we were together. It was like cha-cha was the referee in our relationship. Whenever Alex and I hit trouble in our relationship, Alex turned to cha-cha. If cha-cha hadn't liked me, would Alex and I even be together?

It was Tarun cha-cha who yelled at Alex for sleeping with me before asking me out on a date. It was Tarun cha-cha who chewed him out when I wrote the letter ending our relationship. He always seemed to be there stepping in when he thought Alex was acting out of place.

After I had written the letter ending things with Alex, I wanted to keep my relationship with Tarun cha-cha. The first time all of our paths crossed where I couldn't avoid Alex was a bash for Tarun cha-cha's birthday. His wife, Poonam cha-chi (*) had flown to New York to meet him and celebrate. It was the first time I met her.

To minimize and, if possible, avoid crossing paths with Alex, I went to the party early and scheduled teaching a dance class later that evening. I knew Alex's pattern and he would attend the party much later after work.

I arrived around 5:00pm and spent time with cha-cha and met cha-chi for the first time. We chatted for a while and I finished my glass of wine and got ready to leave.

"Tarun cha-cha, I wish I could stay longer but I have to teach a class."

Out of nowhere a couple walked over to cha-cha "Tarun, Poonam, how are you? It's been too long." The tall elderly Indian man pulled him into a big hug and patted him on the back. "Saal Mubaraak!" (Happy Birthday in Hindi).

The woman next to him hugged Tarun and said, "Happy Birthday, darling! We really need to not wait for birthdays at this age to see each other. It's so good to see you both."

My stomach started to turn as I looked at the Caucasian woman who had a British accent and the striking older Indian man next to her and I knew right away they were Alex's parents. How many couples could there be with an Indian man married to a British woman who were also good friends with Tarun and his wife?

Alex was a blend of them both. He had his mom's blue-green eyes, her high cheekbones, straight nose, and her cool aura and his dad's darker coloring, thick wavy, coarse dark hair, and his dad's height. Even Arjun was a complete blend of them both only it was almost like he had flipped what he had inherited from his parents. He had his mom's lighter coloring, her thick straight auburn hair and her lean built while he had inherited his dad's dark eyes, traditional North Indian features, flirtatious and jovial nature and his dad's height. It was odd, but you could see both Jatin and Helen in both of their sons, but the brothers looked nothing like each other because they had inherited opposite features from their parents.