Annaiah does not understand the small things that interest her. He never tells her anything about what he is feeling or doing. She does not know more about him than the rest of the world does. It is like there is a huge, unscalable, dark stone wall between his emotions and her. But he is also unfailingly kind. Gangi pouts. She wants an ardent lover – she wants the man who claims her body with such passion to speak to her. She wants him to tell her that she is the centre of his life and he cannot live without her. She does not understand his subtle gestures, he does not like her voluble outpourings.

He goes crazy sometimes, demanding strange things and unquestioning obedience from her. He wants to keep her happy, but the forms of Putti and Chikthayi haunt him. He drinks the saraayi that he secretly brews across the wall more and more often. And thinks: this girl is more beautiful and passionate than either of her aunts. But where is her understanding? Does she see the bright red suryavamsi, does she see the white swetasanchari that he gives her every day?

Annaiah is prone to moodiness, and does not turn up when Gangi needs him. She smells dizzying things on him, but does not know what they are. He does not understand her joy and laughter, her pleasure at having cooked her first meal, which he eats without tasting, looking into her eyes. He does not even know what he ate and doesn’t care. He does not see her pleasure at wearing new seeres, which he only impatiently disrobes her of.

She sits inside the temple every evening and listens to the daily stories that he sings to the entire village. She is not allowed to sit with the village people. No one ever speaks to her, not even her brother Byregowda or sister-in-law Gowra, who just avert their glances from the temple every evening when they come for Annaiah’s stories.

The stories start grating on her nerves. Though she has heard them all her life, now she cannot even understand what Annaiah is saying. She can hear the intensity that Annaiah shows her in their private time, but she cannot understand what Ramani or Kamadeva or indeed any of those ghastly flowers have to do with her. He never tells her any of the things that Kamadeva tells Ramani. She doesn’t feel like Ramani does for Kamadeva. She doesn’t even know what she feels for Annaiah anymore.

Soon Gangi begins to remember the glances she exchanged with Kumaraswamy while listening to Annaiah’s stories in this very temple. She sighs. Now she has a man who probably loves her much more that Kumaraswamy ever could. She does not dispute that. Still, this man never gives her a shy glance or a fun smile, he only gives her looks that burn her and eat her up. She has a man who lives in another world and sees things in her that are not there. She can never talk to him, a man who knows so much about love and wonder.