“I’m fine.” The last time she had spoken to him, after insisting she move her things to his house, he had also begged her to fly to Chennai, made her write down his credit card number just in case she changed her mind. And she did, wrote it on the back of the scrap of paper that held his contact numbers. Now, she turned the paper over and over in her hand, looking at his precise blue writing—“parents,” “hospital,” “cell”—on one side, her scrawled penciled numbers on the other.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“Your house.” She looked at the paper and said the numbers in her head, 011 91 9820138181 cell, 011 44 45552889 hospital.

“I can come home in a few days. I can be there soon.”

“No,” she said.

“Yes,” he said, and the word came back doubled across the bad connection. “Damn it. Let me call right back.”

Her stomach tightened, and she pressed her palm gently against her belly. “I can’t … I can’t do this anymore.”

“Can’t do what?”

She was silent.

“Josie, let me call you back,” he said.

“No.” She said it forcefully, and when it echoed back at her, she grew stronger. “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t see you.”

“What are you talking about?” he said.

She was silent.

“Is this about the games? I told you, we won’t do that anymore,” he said. “It doesn’t matter to me. I don’t need to play like that.” The words echoed across the line, and she imagined them tumbling behind each other, bumping across the thousands of miles of optic cable.

“I’m sorry,” she said. She placed the phone down on the receiver, then picked it back up and called a cab.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN