There was an odd streak of common sense that ran through all that fluffiness. At 26, she was comfortable with the idea of getting married and settling down. She had, of course, secretly hoped that a knight in shining armour would appear, riding a gorgeous white stallion. Or maybe a black one black has a more exciting sense of wickedness. Failing this, she was prepared to settle for a decent looking guy in designer jeans, driving one of those fancy new cars that have so flooded the market. He'd come riding. (well, not riding, obviously, but one gets the general idea), snatch her up and carry her off across the seat-belted bucket seats.
It would have saved her all the fuss and bother of making decisions.
Unfortunately, this delightful little dream had stayed... a dream.
So... she decided to do the sensible thing, instead.

And Desikachari turned out to be a real nice guy. Intelligent, but not overwhelmingly so. A fairly good sense of humour, (he had responded to some laughing remark of her Dad's with a fairly quick one-liner, but with the right amount of respect blended in. Who wanted to marry a comedian, anyway?). Appeared to possess just the right amount of idealism. Enough to raise daily thinking and living above the gross "for-pleasure-alone" level, but not overdone to the extent of making life difficult for a spouse who would have found it a little tough to get hot and fervent about every Cause in town. Not too bad-looking either. Unless, of course you were looking for a combination of all the Khans in Bollywood. But Aparna, as pointed out before, had this occasional streak of common sense. So she decided to "Say-Yes".

Desikachari, eating his way through halwa, and trying to pick up mixture in a shallow ever-silver spoon and convey it delicately to his mouth without spraying himself and his chair with bits of puffed rice... (You know, it is time someone realised that regular mixture was never designed to be eaten with a spoon), thought she looked cute and friendly, and felt he might be inclined to "Say-yes" too. He watched her, sitting opposite him demurely while his parents, her parents, a few aunts, a few uncles, and a couple of grandparents made "PC". He caught the demure look and smile, but missed the glint of calculation in her downcast eyes. (Really. Men, sometimes! They shouldn't be allowed out on their own!)

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