All her memories around Baba’s death were fuzzy, like someone had gone over them with a marker and blacked parts out. The only clear part was the blood. It was a good thing Rico left her. His betrayal turned out to be a kindness. There was no way she could have faced him when she couldn’t see past the blood on her hands. Too dirty for him, too damaged for anything beautiful.

I love you, Ash. I’ll do whatever you want to make myself worthy of you. Please don’t leave me. I’m going to start playing again. I’m leaving for the UK. Please, just call me back.

When she got that message it was too late. It had been the last time she heard his voice.

Don’t ever contact me again. We can’t be together.

After sending that last message, Ashna had pulled her hand back and thrown her phone into the bay. The last time she’d made a throw. The last time she’d expected to say anything to the boy she loved. She wished her last memory of him wasn’t him calling her father a sick asshole.

Months before, Baba had sent in an application for her to Le Cordon Bleu. A week after the private cremation, she had left the ashes to her aunt and uncle to spread over the cliffs at the Sagar Mahal and flown to Paris and started at the culinary school. The family had used all its influence to hide Baba’s suicide and keep it out of the papers. Baba had never had friends, but his patrons believed he’d gone back to India and left the restaurant to Aseem and Baba’s executive chef.

In Paris, cooking hadn’t given her solace per se, but it had connected her somehow to Baba and eased the boulder of guilt off her chest. Growing up, Ashna had hated being in the kitchen or having anything to do with food. At first it was because she’d wanted to be outside with a ball, but then Baba’s insistence on everything to do with food being just so had felt stifling. This is how biryani must be cooked. This is how a crab shell must be cracked. This is how trifle pudding must be eaten. Focus on the food, Ashna; how will you taste it if you’re too busy talking?

In Paris, his rules, which she had found suffocating growing up, had become comforting. The exact opposite of how Rico had gone back to soccer. He’d found freedom in it and she’d used it to lock herself up. Cooking had been Ashna’s long-drawn-out apology. Every chop, stir, dice had felt like she was doing something to erase what she had caused.