‘You promise?’

‘I promise. You promise?’

‘I want time to think.’

‘All right, tell me tomorrow.’

‘Tomorrow? Mummy don’t be absurd, how can I take such a big decision without consulting him?’

‘Him? Listen to this girl, she is already talking about a “him”. Call the fellow by his name, the man is to be your husband, talk about this man like he is God and he will start pretending to be one.’

‘You should know, right?’

‘Go away, go to bed, tell me tomorrow.’

‘Oh, all right, I promise.’

Mother, daughter; daughter, mother: interchangeable most times. Between these two women can spring a strong affinity and an equally strong tension. The bond, a result of a recognition that neither women can express. The tension, an outcome of what one woman must always suspect, for the other to deny; because they are supposed to not be friends.

These have been clear, dry and cool nights. Starry and sharp. The air spiked with a special silence. She has slept like a baby through each, no nightmares, no dreams, not one; waking only to walk to her hotel’s window to see if the night is still there; wishing star intact.

She smiles, it will end soon, she must spoil it herself to end it, she must destroy it before it can get snatched away from her; she must only be a tentatively accepted visitor in her own fantasy.

She smiles. He gives her a sidelong glance and looks back to the road, he changes gears to negotiate a turn at Jubilee Hills and observes, ‘You have been smiling throughout our drive.’

‘Yes,’ she says simply.

‘What were you thinking of?’

My naram takiya, she wants to say, its cool comfort and yet its sensuous satin against my cheek; like your cognac eyes on my face.

A baby with you, she wants to tell him.

It’s her fantasy, say whatever she wants.

‘I am waiting,’ he says softly over the purr of his car’s powerful engine.

‘You are a wonderful man.’

He laughs, easily, naturally, in bass, ‘Why this compliment?’

‘My blood sings under my skin when I am with you. You know this. Yet you have done nothing to take advantage of the situation. And I know your blood hums for me.’

He says something in Telugu, his timbre like liquid gold.

‘I did not understand that.’

‘Bombay woman, what do I make of you?’

‘Is that what you said in Telugu?’

‘No.’

He moves his hand from the gear stick to her knee.

‘Put your hand on mine,’ he says. She does. ‘Now take it away.’ She does.

He moves his hand back to the stick shift, he says, ‘What did you feel?’

‘Skin. And bones.’

‘You could not have felt my bones, they melt when you are near me. I adore you.’

Something pricks her eyelids; quickly, quickly, spoil this. ‘Adore? That’s a really old-fashioned word.’

He looks at her, sidelong, those cognac eyes caressing her face, ‘You are very different, Bombay woman; stay this way, so strong.’