Her memory of the Taj Mahal had not faded in the slightest. Or perhaps the monument had frozen in time during the intervening years. In a life with interruptions, surprises, disappointments, the Mahal was the only true constant, the place where her great-grandparents, Manoj and Kavita, had mourned the division of India, the place her grandparents, Deepa and Amir, had begun their courtship, where her father Vijay had once pledged to be a better father to her. So many promises were made, so many hopes birthed on its terrace, so many dreams envisioned. It was, for all of them, a place of infinite beginnings, a fitting place for Shanti to begin again. And it was the perfect day to do so—the seventieth anniversary of Independence.

Sunrays glowed along the white marble of the terrace. Tourists milled about. Selfie sticks bisected the air, their owners jostled and angled to get the perfect background shot, to relax their smiles into something that felt a little more natural.

“Over here,” Laila called. She raised her sunglasses, squinted. Laila had not been to the Taj Mahal since she was six years old. She was not certain she could accompany Shanti on this trip. But a local university in Agra had invited Laila to speak to their history department about her art and helped to arrange her visitor’s visa from Pakistan.

Shan walked to her aunt’s side. Chandani, who had been snapping photos of the exterior, soon followed. Laila led them both to the northwest side overlooking the Yamuna River and Agra Fort. She set her hand on the railing.

“This is the exact spot where I first met your grandmother,” Laila said. “It’s one of the first memories I have as a child. I remember, so vividly, how Deepa and Amir looked at each other, the rhythm and beats of their conversation, the slight variations in their expressions, their demeanors, the intentions conveyed so seamlessly in the silences.” Laila sighed. “I wish Deepa could have been with us here now.”

They both felt her absence acutely. But a reunion was forthcoming. Next week, she and Shanti would travel to Amsterdam together.

“Aunty, I know this spot,” Shanti said. “My father had brought me right here to look out at this same view.” She leaned over. She peered down below to the Yamuna River, tributary of the Ganges River, which started in the Himalayas, flowed through Delhi, eastward into Bangladesh, and emptied, eventually into the Bay of Bengal. One body of water joined another and then another in an endless cycle that would continue long after they all departed this earth.

When her father brought her here thirty years earlier, she sensed the immortality of this place. There was a timelessness to it. And today, the link between her father, her grandparents, and her great-grandparents seemed stronger than ever, present in ways she couldn’t explain.

“Turn around, you two,” said Chandani. “We need to memorialize this.”