“Thank you,” Meena replied, taking a seat on the bed.

I gazed up at the elaborately painted ceiling. “I’m surprised you went into engineering instead of design. You clearly missed your calling,” I said, enviously wondering if there was anything she couldn’t do.

“My parents preferred engineering,” she said quietly.

I continued looking around the room, stepping past a row of large shopping bags to take a glimpse at the single photograph on the nightstand. It was a framed picture of Meena and a handsome man sitting next to each other on a couch. She was wearing a pale pink lehenga choli, and he was wearing a white kurta suit. They were smiling into the camera as he placed a ring on her finger.

“So this must be the lucky guy.” I pointed to the photo.

She nodded, blushing, as she leaned against the headboard.

In the few hours I had known her, Meena had only asked questions about me. She had yet to say anything about her wedding. Not that it mattered, but it was so unlike American brides. When my friend Harper got engaged her senior year of college, she talked about her upcoming nuptials ad nauseam. And although that was almost five years ago, she continued to post wedding photos online even to this day. While I still didn’t really care much for Meena or her wedding, a part of me was eager to know more about the handsome man in the photograph. Where did they meet? What was he like? Was he as perfect as she was?

“How did you and your fiancé meet?” I finally asked, plopping down on the bed.

“Our fathers work at the same office.”

“Have you known each other for a while?” I pried curiously.

“We only met three times.”

I raised my eyebrows.

“His father showed him a photograph of me and that’s how it began.” She smiled.

This was oddly reminiscent of my father’s story about his choosing my mother. What is it with Indian people and picking a spouse from a single photograph? Aren’t they aware of Instagram filters and Photoshop and catfishers? Meena must have also been a subscriber to the whole “love after marriage” theory.

“How did you know he was the one after only three meetings?”

“This is a very common saying in America, no? The one.” She held out both hands as she emphasized each word dramatically. She turned to me, her dimples deepening. “Haroon is a nice boy. Both our families approve. That makes him the one.”

It seemed like too simple a criterion to explain such a huge decision. I still couldn’t wrap my mind around it.

“You know, Leila, marriage is different for us Indian girls,” Meena explained. “I’ve never lived away from home or traveled abroad. We don’t have the same privileges as you do in America.”

Privileges? What privileges did I have that she didn’t? In fact, she was much more accomplished in every aspect of her life than I ever could be.