‘Your eyes are wet.’
‘That’s just emotion. Very different.’
He laughed, popping a kiss on my forehead. ‘Gladiator II? I’ve been wanting to watch it for a while.’
‘Sounds perfect.’
We settled in, his arm around my shoulders, and for a few hours, I let myself live in a world where everything was this simple.
The movie was good – not as good as the first part – but we both enjoyed it anyway.
When evening rolled around, I decided it was time to go home.
‘I’m giving you a ride,’ Jai said, entering his walk-in closet. ‘Just let me get dressed for dinner first.’
‘No, you’ll be late. I’ll just take a cab.’
‘Harish uncle lives in the house next to your building.’ He turned to look at me. ‘It’s not out of the way or an inconvenience at all.’
‘It’s probably nothing. But the morning of my interview, I saw Jai near my building. He was getting in a cab.’My words to Rekha echoed in my head.
Jai had to be there to see Harish uncle.
And Rekha now knew it. I hoped it wasn’t important.
13
Polaroids
Ananya
Dilip pulled over the car in front of my building. Traffic hadn’t been bad, which meant Jai had thirty minutes spare before dinner.
I turned to him and paused, my hand on the door handle. ‘Do you want to come over for a bit?’
He smiled slowly. ‘I’d love to.’
‘I should warn you,’ I said on our way up. ‘Rhea can be a handful. Don’t take anything she says personally; she means well.’
‘You’ve talked so much about her, I’m sure she’s great,’ he said good-naturedly. ‘I’m looking forward to meeting her.’
I slid the key in and opened the door.
The flat was silent – no music from songs or reels, or loud talking on the phone.She’s not home. I fished my phone out of my pocket. Thirteen WhatsApp notifications, twelve of which were from her, ranging from questions about my evening with Jai to an outfit check for the coffee date she was on right now. I sent some fire emojis.
‘She’s on a date, so you might have to wait a bit longer to meet her,’ I said. ‘But on the bright side, it’s just the two of us for now.’
Jai gave me a nod as he stared at the wall taped with our Polaroid pictures.
‘You look so cute in this one,’ he said, pointing to a picture in which I was grinning widely at the camera, a cake in my hand.
‘It was my twenty-second birthday.’ I remember having so much fun at that party. ‘You’re going to love this one especially…’ I looked around a bit more before I found it.
It was clicked five seconds later, when my friends had smeared the cake all over my face and were laughing at me.
‘I do.’ He chuckled. ‘I’m going to need a copy of it.’
‘No promises.’ My smile faded when he spotted my sewing machine tucked away in the corner. My sketchbook was right next to it.
