She paused.
“Umm… I don’t know what’s that.”
He huffed.
“Don’t huff at me!”
“I am not,” he chuckled. “Look at that branch.” He pointed to a branch of the peru tree over them.
“Hmm.”
“Now follow the line of stars behind it. Can you see them? Going in a curve like a ladle?” He traced.
“Yes. Those four stars?”
“Yes. Those four and then three that go straight up, like the handle of the ladle?”
“Oh yes… one, two, three… seven stars.”
“Saptarishi.”
“I can see it!”
“Now, count the third star from the edge of the handle.” He held out his arm, pointing his finger. “One, two, three.” They counted together.
“That third star. Bright one? Can you see?”
“Yes.”
“Now look at the star above it, it’s very close but less bright.” He moved his finger up. She paused, trying to locate it.
“Aaah…! No… Oh! Yes, yes, it’s like in a straight line to it. That one?”
“Hmm. That’s Arundhati.” Samar told her. “The bright one is Vashishth. They are the binary stars Atharva was talking about.”
“You woke me up to show me this?”
“I woke you up because on the night of the wedding, a man shows his wife Vashishth and Arundhati. I didn’t know why, but after Atharva mentioned about them going around each other, I realised why.”
She stilled in his arms.
“Amaal?”
Her face turned upwards towards him, her eyes suddenly shining.
“What happened?”
“Thank you.”
He took her mouth into his. She kissed him back, her body losing whatever little tightness there was and completely melting into his. When he let her go, her eyes were still shining, but brighter. Blue of every open sky he had ever had the privilege to walk under.
“How do you know about this ritual? I have never heard about it.”
“They do it in our community.” He pulled her close, the hammock now still enough for him to adjust her position. “I attended a wedding when I was a teenager and there they were making the groom walk out of the mandap to show stars to the bride. I also went, like so many other kids, to see what’s the hype.”
“Then?”
“The Panditji murmured to the couple about things we didn’t really care about. But then he turned to us and asked us to learn how to locate Arundhati. He said we would need it too one day. And I went away from there.”
