‘I’m calling your bluff,’ he says. ‘Show me the video.’
‘Whatever,’ I say, scrambling to my feet.
After a long beat, he says, ‘Let’s do something.’
I raise an eyebrow. ‘Something? Like go out? Again?’
He almost seems embarrassed by the idea, but he nods. ‘I saw some places online. Beach clubs. Or whatever. We can just sit here too.’
And for the first time, I don’t think I’m okay with sitting here. Sitting locked up in your own room is one thing—it’s familiar territory—but staying here for the entirety of the night while sleep evades me? Nope.
‘I think we should go,’ I say.
An hour later, we are both ready. I have on a white and red cotton dress and while I’m applying make-up, I can hear him on the phone again—his work phone, I guess. He’s sending voice notes to someone. It can’t be Sumrit; Tejal just called a little while ago and he was with her. Who is he talking to? And why is he smiling so much? Maybe I should ask. Or maybe I should just let him be. If he’s finding his way out of this labyrinth of sadness, he deserves all the happiness in the world. Today, he’s in a pale blue linen shirt. I want to compliment him but I don’t want to make it weird.
‘You look nice,’ he says, and it doesn’t sound weird at all. It feels like the most natural thing in the world. Then he adds, ‘Compared to other days, I mean.’
‘Same to you,’ I tell him.
On the way to the beach club that every Instagram reel promised would blow our minds, we stop at a coffee shop. We both order double espressos. Then we stop at a cake shop and have a sandwich and a croissant that we split. By the time we reach the club, it’s dark and the neon signs are flickering to life. The line outside is long. We get patted down for weapons or flasks. Inside, the place is teeming with beautiful, happy people.Everyone’s drunk and having fun while we are just staring at each other, looking super awkward.
‘I’m sure it’s fun when you’re drunk,’ Raghav says, looking at everyone around us. ‘What do you want?’
‘I want to check the menu,’ I say, a stark reminder that I don’t really know what’s fun for him, what he looks like when he has fun.
We find a table in a corner near the swinging doors of the washroom. Our waiter suggests a large pitcher of sangria, and Raghav insists on paying this time. Two glasses in, our hunger feels bottomless. We order a Margherita pizza, which is followed quickly by butter chicken and parathas. Even then, I feel like I could eat more.
‘Look at us,’ he says. ‘Uncle and aunty, stuffing parathas on a night out.’
‘Who said night out?’ I reply. ‘I might need a nap pretty soon if I don’t stop eating and go for a small walk right now.’
‘But we can’t get up right now,’ he says, pointing to the sangria pitcher that’s still half-full. ‘We need to finish this first.’
Fifteen minutes later, the pitcher is empty, the fruit pieces lay at the bottom, and we are both suppressing burps.
‘Should we dance?’ I ask.
The question is loaded. And yet the answer seems obvious to me. Of course, we should dance. We walk to the sandy dance floor. Another realization strikes me: I have been living with this guy for thirteen months and I don’t even know how he dances, if he dances at all. And he knows nothing about my dancing, which used to be top-notch. For a while, we don’t dance with each other, but near each other, maintaining a safe, awkward distance. We maintain a safe distance from dancing too, because we are just swaying.
Then slowly, I watch him open up. He’s surprisingly good. Why did I assume he wouldn’t be? And when a trap version ofan old Punjabi song plays, he really starts to dance. Spurred on by him, I join in. It’s now that the sangria starts to hit. We don’t stop for what feels like hours. What am I feeling then? I’m not feeling shitty, that’s what I’m feeling.
He looks like he could go on, but I can’t. To tell him I need to sit, I grab his arm. The contact is brief, practical. Just muscle and bone and warmth. And yet, it feels like something. He smiles at me and follows me off the dance floor.
We sit back down, breathless.
‘That was not . . . bad,’ I say.
He doesn’t answer, but a small smile plays on his lips. As I look around at the laughing, dancing crowd, it hits me. They’re all living in a different movie. We’re just visiting the set. The feeling isn’t happiness. It’s just... witnessing it, borrowing a little from them. The feeling curdles a few seconds later, as it always does. The quiet voice returns:What are you doing here? You don’t deserve this.
Raghav notices. ‘You okay?’
I nod. ‘Just tired.’
He sees through it. He always does. But he doesn’t press. ‘There’s a beach nearby. There might be fewer people.’
And so, he leads me away from the thumping bass of the club. The transition is jarring. We walk out of the bubble of neon lights to the quiet, humid darkness of the night just a few hundred yards away. The music fades behind us. Soon it’s replaced by the shushing of the waves. The air changes. The wind brings with it the sharp scent of salt. We find a narrow path that winds down to the shore. We take off our shoes. We walk in silence for a long time, just the sound of the ocean and our own breathing. The moon hangs low and heavy in the sky. It’s beautiful in every clichéd way.
‘Is it awful if I say tonight wasn’t a complete disaster?’ I whisper.
