When the needle peak of Mahalakshmi Hill recedes and date palms appear, you know you are near Surgaon. Toddy, coconut and date palms are the region's resident trees. They were Ashesh and Anima's childhood challenges. Come climb, they said. The bruises of answering those challenges have remained as memories on Anima's skin.

Like her skin, the trunks of palms tell stories of their age. As the palm grows, it sheds its fronds, leaving a deep ring behind. Count the ridges circling the trunk to read the history of the tree. Observe the long clusters of green dates nestled close to the trunk and you know the fruit will turn a plump orange, tight with pulp and juice, in a month's time. Anima's tongue, even at the age of forty-seven, salivates shamelessly.

It's time to rise. Anima twists her torso a little to get her sweaty back unstuck from the back of the seat and pulls her blouse down. Mr Loma contracts in fear. You never know when porcupines will strike. She raises a derisive eyebrow at him and moves to the door.

At Surgaon station the heavy, sweet fragrance of mogras floats high above all the other smells. Little children scurry up and down the platform carrying baskets of leaf cones filled with black sour berries. Young men top paper-cone servings of fried gram dal spiced with finely chopped onion, fresh coriander and a squeeze of lemon. Outside, brown, rough-skinned chikus with their surprisingly soft, sweet pulp are piled high beside translucent love apples. Together they constitute the Surgaon scent.

Anima ambles down the station road sniffing the air, smiling. Even today she misses old Shantaram's gruff call, practically ordering one into his horse carriage for the ride to the Joshi bungalow. His mouth was off-kilter like his cap, but his talk was straight. He went years ago. Now his son drives an autorickshaw, drawls like a film hero and drinks half his earnings.

Anima doesn’t take Shantaram's son's rickshaw, though he invites her in. She needs time to prepare for the meeting with her mother. Walking will give it to her. But it's hot. Holi is still two weeks away, but what passes for winter in Surgaon has already fled. Drops of sweat fall from Anima's frizzy, tightly bound hair to the nape of her neck like Chinese torture. In the old days, summer would begin precisely on the day after Holi like somebody had switched it on.