“I know we have to go in eventually. But I can’t face it yet.” The reality of entering the house and not finding Sunil. Never again finding Sunil. Kavita gazes across the street at the flicker of television reflected in her neighbours’ front window. She pictures them sprawled on the couch, snacking on chips, chatting during the commercial breaks. Spending an evening blanketed in the comforts of banality. Taking it for granted the way fortunate people have the good fortune to do. The way she had lived until about a week ago.

She hugs her knees in for warmth. “I still can’t believe it.”

“It must be the shock.”

But that wasn’t it. “No, it’s this,” she says. “This is really happening.” But it wasn’t supposed to.

Why, Bear? she thinks to her elder brother, invoking her ancient nickname for him, which she hasn’t used in years but somehow comes back to her now, her version of bhaiya, a word which had been too knotting to her toddler tongue. Bear always felt more befitting of Sunil and Kavita meant it with no less affection than the Indian endearment. What changed your mind?

Sunil had called her at work, which alone surprised her. But when he asked her to leave early and come home without delay, she knew something wasn’t right.

The four of them gathered in the living room.

With his gaze fixed on the dusty rose carpet, Sunil began to tell them about his plan to end his life, all at once, mechanically, as though playing a cassette, as though he had rehearsed the lines too many times before. That he would drive far away, somewhere secluded, somewhere they would never find him. Swallow the sleeping pills he had been hoarding for weeks. Wait for the coma of a poisonous sleep.

As he spoke, Kavita’s body hardened as if his unreal words were an icy fog trying to leach into her marrow, but every part of her refused to absorb it. She couldn’t speak. But the first thought to enter her frozen mind was, He doesn’t mean it. How could her Sunil—her beautiful brother, the kindest, gentlest person she had ever known—want to cause himself such harm? Shock soon dissolved into fear like ice into puddles. Her next thought was a silent declaration to her brother: I won’t let you hurt yourself, Sunil. And finally: I’m going to save you. And that’s all there is to it. That was the power Kavita thought she possessed—the magic to dissolve terror in a potion of resolve. Simple. Done.

“I’m sorry,” Sunil went on, as their mother wrung her hands, and their father gripped the carpet with his toes. He hadn’t meant to hurt them, but he needed them to know. He was scared of himself and what he might do.

“What happened?” Kavita asked him. “How did it come to this?”