The blue and red light from the TV screen incited flames in Asrar’s doused heart. Jamila Miss’s heightened responses added to Asrar’s amazement. Miss turned into the nude, attractive and hot protagonist from the movie. She had made Asrar bleed. The next morning, Asrar saw that his neck, forehead, fingers, stomach and other parts of the body were covered in Jamila Miss’s bite marks. Despite this ferociousness and the complete involvement of his body, his soul was still coloured in Hina’s hues. He remembered that the night before when Miss had undergone that transformation, he had felt that he was not with Jamila Miss but with Hina.

It was summer. He used to go and sit on the beach in Mabadmorpho every evening lost in thought. He often found himself in a dark room where he would see his uncle smiling. In the same room he saw a woman, but his heart refused to recognize her. He felt as if there was even more darkness outside the room and his father was standing there and crying. Whenever he was in a thoughtful mood, he would get up and walk towards the sea and talk to the waves. The cold water awakened a new zest within him. He would look at the waves coming from afar and would wonder where they had started their journey, why they had undertaken the journey and when it had started. He tried getting rid of these thoughts that were bothering him.

He returned to Mumbai on 1 April.

The next day he met Hina at a restaurant near the Nagpada junction. Asrar placed a bag in her hand which his mother had given as a gift. They talked for a while and decided that they would meet on Sunday, sharp at 11 a.m. at the Mumbai Central ticket counter. From there they would go and visit a place that they had never been to.

Hina went home. She opened the bag to find that Asrar’s mother had sent her home-made pickle, papads and a dozen hapus mangoes.

Darakhshan asked her, ‘What is it that you have brought?’

Hina said, ‘Vidhi’s father had come to meet her. Vidhi has given me some things from what he had brought for her.’

Darakhshan was satisfied with the answer but whenever she ate that pickle, she would say, ‘It tastes like Konkani pickle.’

Once Hina finally asked her, ‘Maa, how do you know what the taste of Konkani pickle is like?’

Darakhshan told her that before her marriage, she lived in a Kolsa mohalla. A lot of Konkanis lived in that area. Whenever they visited Konkan, they would bring pickles and papad for their neighbours. Darakhshan said that she ate a lot of Konkani pickle, and her mother would scold her for overeating. Hina laughed at this and said, ‘True, Konkani pickle is definitely very tasty.’

‘When did you eat it?’ Darakhshan inquired.

‘You just said that this pickle tastes like Konkani, so I guessed it might be good.’ Hina made it up.