Whenever their grandmother Archi cursed Nala’s father, he said ‘demensha’ and rolled his eyes the way Nala did. Her mother would shush him, but the children could see she was trying not to laugh. According to Nala’s mother, Archi was too young to have dementia; she was forty-eight years old. But Nala’s father liked to remind her that it ran in the family and cursing could be the first sign. Amma would shush Appa again.

‘Her presha was too high and the baby came too early,’ Nala continued her medical report. She heard the doctor say that high presha ran in their family: like demensha.

She opened her notebook and started writing. Her father had given it to her for her birthday, because she was good at drawing. She liked to carry it around with her everywhere. Pressing hard with her pencil, she wrote: 18th April 1936, Amma has hi presha. It was a few days after Tamil New Year, but no one had celebrated this year. Amma couldn’t go to the temple or anywhere for thirty-one days after the baby.

‘Where’s the baby?’ Mohan asked quietly.

‘Dead,’ she replied. She wanted to cry. Amma had been in her room all week and Nala knew she wasn’t eating or sleeping; only crying. Amma had been certain the baby inside her this time was a boy.

Nala’s younger sister Kamini was born three years ago. Amma had cried then too. The little girl was beautiful and healthy, but Amma didn’t care. She remembered hearing Archi try to comfort Amma. ‘It will happen, mahal, soon, it will happen.’

But it didn’t happen soon. It took a long time for Amma to have babies. Some of Nala’s aunties had babies every year. That was why she had so many cousins, but Mohan was her favourite. She was convinced that Amma’s babies took longer because they came out fairer, like her.

Amma’s next visitor was the family astrologer. Amma wouldn’t listen to Appa or Archi or the doctor. In desperation, Archi had called Mr Viswanathan. He used to be the family tailor, but his hobby had turned out to be surprisingly accurate. He had given up tailoring and taken up full-time astrology. It was Mr Viswanathan who had read and matched Amma and Appa’s charts, when Appa’s family first proposed to Amma’s family. Both families trusted Mr Viswanathan; they knew it would be a good match.

Standing on her cousin-brother’s back again, Nala watched the astrologer. He sat on a chair next to Amma’s bed and opened up his books. Amma stirred but still didn’t move.

‘Thangachi, little sister,’ said the old man, ‘your Sanni period has ended now.’ He leaned forward to show her a chart with twelve boxes on it. He pointed to the different boxes.