Later, when they left Tholur together, she said to him, ‘You looked at me that way when the line in the song was about stealing the woman away. And now you really are doing it.’ And he laughed, saying, ‘Yes! I am going to carry you away and lay you on a cot in the forest.’

They had both wanted to watch that film, but they had not even started talking to each other properly then. Besides, Kumaresan’s wounds were still healing. He was in no state to go for a movie.

At nine one morning, when she left from home with the lunch bag, she placed a small container outside his door. As she walked away, she kept turning back to glance at him. From inside his room, he saw her and realized that she must have done something special. After waiting until she had walked some distance, he rushed to the door, picked up the vessel and came back into the room. The little pot was filled with kari kozhambu, with pieces of meat floating on top. Every day, he made rice and waited for Periyasami to come and make some kozhambu. Sometimes Periyasami came very late, and on those days, Kumaresan just mixed the rice with some water and drank it.

Leaving the door half-open, he mixed the kozhambu with the rice, and ate it. All her affection was in the kozhambu. He didn’t know how she knew that he loved sucking the marrow from the pieces of bone, but she had put two long bones in the kozhambu. He sucked them both with much relish, pleasurably imagining that he was placing his lips on hers and gently sucking on them. How had she managed to get all this meat? Did she go to the market first thing in the morning to buy it? What had she told the vendor? She had given him all the best portions of the meat. She must have picked the meat out herself. Knowing that she had prepared this just for him made him very happy.

He took his time eating. He used his fingers to scoop up every last drop of the kozhambu from the pot, and then licked it clean. The gravy his mother made was very watery, like rasam. He could drink it up. But this kozhambu was different; it was thick and flavourful. Even a small amount was enough to mix with a lot of rice. He wanted to enjoy such pleasures for the rest of his life. When she returned home that afternoon, the little pot with the lid on it was outside her door. She picked it up and went inside. There was a small note inside the sparkling clean vessel. ‘I wish for this to last forever. Is that possible?’

Immediately, she said ‘Hmm’—a yes—within her heart, but it swelled up slowly and grew into a sound. She thought it would float in the air and reach his ears. She truly believed that he could hear every word she uttered in her heart—that he was aware of all her thoughts, just as she knew his. She tried expressing the ‘Hmm’ in many different ways. Then, feeling shy, she lay face down on her cot. She could not even think about lunch that day. She fell asleep.