The single tick turned double and then turned blue. I held my breath, remembering that this scene had come on TV just after he’d been flirting with me. I hadn’t mentioned that to Nisha.

I could see him online but there was no reply. As the seconds ticked by, I was regretting sending him the gif. I should have just said ‘hi’. I put the phone on the desk, aware that I would have to hide it away as soon as the bell rang and the next lecturer came in.

‘Come on,’ I urged my phone silently.

Almost as though it had heard my silent plea, the screen lit up and I grabbed it.

He had sent a gif of Sridevi doing her famous nagin dance in her pink ghagra, twirling and hissing at the screen. It made me laugh loudly.

The phone lit up with another message.

‘Let’s be clear. I nagin, but you no sapera. You mongoose.’

The grin on my face refused to die down even when the lecturer walked inside the classroom briskly, holding her register.

26

I didn’t meet Raghu that evening or the next. We texted once or twice, but I wanted to see him again, to gauge how things were between us. I discovered I’d have to wait for a very long time because the day after that, Aunty V informed me that Raghu had returned to Mumbai.

‘Why?’ I asked, surprised. I was disappointed that he hadn’t even bothered to tell me he was leaving. Surely, he could have let me know.

‘It’s his father. He wants Raghu to study and take some tests for his university applications,’ Aunty V replied, looking grim. She seemed to have forgotten that she had wanted him to do that too. Maybe seeing Raghu happy working at the restaurant had changed her mind.

What about what Raghu wanted, I wanted to know. I was surprised at how forlorn I felt at the thought of not meeting him again and not even knowing when he was coming back.

‘Raghu is just doing it so that his father shuts up. But in the end that boy will do what he wants,’ she said, as though reading my mind.

I didn’t know what to say to that so I walked away, wondering if he would text me. But I didn’t hear from him for several days.

I wasn’t heartbroken, but I was disappointed. I’d expected better from him. I’d been ignoring him all these years but that was different. We had cleared our misunderstanding and we were friends again, weren’t we?