He raised his glass to his wildly dancing teammates. Maybe it was time to stop wishing for things to happen magically and do the work to fix what was keeping him from what he wanted. A family, love, the ability to feel. Maybe it was time to finally leave Ashna Raje behind.

Chapter Four

Ashi hated the idea of being left behind. There was this thing that happened in her chest when Mamma was about to leave, like giant hands were crushing her ribs. The need to stretch her neck and gulp air pushed at her, but she couldn’t move because she was hiding.

Hiding behind curtains was never the smartest idea, but Ashi had found that you could hide anywhere without the fear of being found when no one cared about looking for you.

Still, she shrank into herself in her little alcove in the bay window of Baba’s den.

“I will never let you use a child to tie me down.” Mamma’s voice had a way of getting deeper when she was angry. How many times had Ashi heard her mother say that the stereotype of the shrill woman had to be broken? That it was something the patriarchy used to prove us too emotional to care for ourselves? “Not that this marriage needs more deadweight to suffocate me.”

Ashi’s hand tightened around the curtain that hid her from her screaming parents. Actually, they weren’t screaming, at least not yet, just hissing at each other in those muted whispers that adults used when they wanted to scream but couldn’t.

“How can you say such a thing? How can you look at Ashi’s face and think such a thing?” Baba sounded how he always sounded around Mamma—nothing like himself but like a spoiled child who was trying to sound grown-up.

Ashi loosened her grip on the fabric. Having the curtain collapse on her head would certainly give her away. If Mamma and Baba knew she had heard them, she’d never be able to face them again. The shame of knowing that her mother had never wanted her was bearable only so long as no one knew that Ashi knew. Shame had a way of multiplying when other people saw it. It made you naked and gross.

“This isn’t about Ashi. Stop trying to use her. You put us in this situation. And now I get to make all the sacrifices. I get to be the mother who disrupts her life yet again, and you get your excuse to go off the rails and do what you do,” Mamma said in her deepened voice. The slit between the thick velvet curtains exposed her in slivers, making her look as though she were being reflected in a broken mirror.