‘I don’t know how relationships can work today with all of the outside distractions. While you and I have been talking, those two girls haven’t once looked up or acknowledged that other people are around them. They are together, but they could not be further apart.’ I squeezed her arm, searching for something to distract her from her train of thought. My heart was still too sensitive to explain to Maa in-depth how I felt for Sakshi or how deeply her rejection had affected me. Thinking about her, about what she had done, brought the familiar feeling of pressure in my chest. I guided Maa towards a stall where brightly coloured pots hung from a white rope.

‘What do you think of these?’ I asked her, hoping that she would change the subject. ‘We could put them on the shelf in the kitchen to bring in some colour?’ She nodded thoughtfully before answering.

‘If you don’t mind, I would prefer those roses over there.’ She pointed towards cardboard-bound bunches of crimson and yellow roses. I smiled. She knew that, before Sakshi had dropped the news on me, I was looking for a new place where all of us could live together happily once she had graduated, and that I continued to distract myself with pictures of dream homes. The stairs to our third-floor apartment were beginning to become a problem for Maa and, sooner rather than later, I would need to find a place where there was an elevator she could use.

I patted her arm, and we walked over to the flowers. I watched her face as she breathed in the scent of a bunch of crimson roses. Looking up at the stall owner, I gestured that we would take two.

Arm in arm, I walked with Maa; no more conversations about Sakshi were had. Instead, we spoke about where she would like to live when we moved, and what we would get in the market to make it our home.

19. JHANVI

19

JHANVI

Three days without Kavya. Have you ever gone for days without your lifeline? I hated to admit it, but I missed her. Missed her visits and her random messages through the day. It didn’t bother me during the day, but at night, in the solitude of my apartment, I realised that I was completely alone, other than the strangers who wished they had my life.

I was busy, though, and finally in control of what I was doing, although there was no routine. I had the club opening on Friday night, and no one to take with me. I had to take someone—I couldn’t be that woman who seemed desperate and alone—but there was no way that Kavya would say yes. I wasn’t even sure she would accept an apology from me yet.