‘I felt . . .’ I hesitate. ‘I felt normal for a minute. And then I felt guilty for feeling normal.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he says. ‘The guilt is the cover charge for any moment of peace.’

  ‘Like Aman should’ve been there,’ I say. ‘Or Megha. That we’re not allowed to . . . dance without them.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘I just miss him so much.’

  ‘Me too,’ he says. ‘All the time.’

  We fall into a heavy silence after that. I make shapes with my toes on the sand. The waves wash them away periodically. We sit like that for a while longer. Finally, I break the quiet.

  ‘We should probably go back?’ I ask.

  He nods, not looking at me. ‘Yeah.’

  He helps me up. And we walk back towards the distant lights of the resort.

  27

  Raghav

  The next morning, I wake up to the feeling of a crushing hangover. Which is a change from the usual anxiousness. So that’s good. Aditi’s still sprawled on the bed, drooling like she always does, gross but also cute. I sit there waiting for her to wake up, and when she doesn’t, I tiptoe out of the room.

  A little later, I’m standing in front of a breakfast buffet that seems to stretch for miles. And yet the place is packed. Even more packed are the tables of guests where there are the little pyramids of fruits and pancakes and omelettes and croissants. A lot of food will get wasted today. Before today, I thought only Indians and others with terrible inequality are cheap, but no, it’s a worldwide phenomenon. I’m happy about that.

  I load up my plate too, giving into the trap that maybe, just maybe stuffing my face with food will make the hangover go away, when time and again it has been proved otherwise. I walk past the many tables—honeymooning couples holding hands over plates of pastries, families trying to coax their kids away from the chocolate fountain, forcing them to eat some fruit. They all look like they belong here.

  Then I see her.

  Aditi is standing by the waffle station, rubbing her eyes. She’s wearing a simple white dress, and her hair is still slightly damp from a shower. She looks . . . lighter today. Less haunted. When did she wake up?

  ‘This is . . . a lot,’ I say as I walk up to her pouring honey over her waffles.

  ‘They have five different kinds of honey,’ she tells me. ‘Got to try them all.’

  ‘Isn’t all this a bit much?’ I say.

  Her eyes light up. ‘I know, right? I’m so excited.’

  Strange choice of words. I haven’t heard that from her. I don’t point it out and we navigate the buffet together, like a team trying to make the most of it.

  We find a table outside, overlooking one of the infinity pools. Kids are already splashing in it. Lucky bastards.

  ‘They will never know true happiness,’ she says, pointing at the kids. ‘If they get everything now, what’s there to level up?’

  ‘Sounds like sour grapes,’ I tell her.

  ‘Maybe,’ she says with a smile.

  For a while, we just eat, the silence comfortable for the first time in a long time. Just two normal people on a vacation.

  ‘So,’ she says finally, pushing a piece of pineapple around her plate. ‘What’s the plan for today?’

  Again, these are a few words I haven’t heard from her. Or me. They are new. They were once potentially ugly, but now, here, they sound manageable. The question hangs in the air.

  ‘I saw a brochure in the lobby,’ I hear myself say. ‘For snorkelling.’

  For a moment, there’s no expression on her face. I wonder if this was a trap. That she would turn around and say, you really wanted to go out and be touristy, that’s weird. But then, her face changes and she says, ‘Snorkelling?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I say, trying to sound more confident than I feel.

  ‘But I don’t know how to swim,’ she says.

  ‘I don’t think it’s needed,’ I tell her. ‘There are life jackets.’

  ‘Hmmm, I don’t mind. I mean . . . what’s the worst that can happen?’ she says.

  Yes, what’s the worst that can happen.

  So she goes back to the room and I go to the hotel lobby and lock two spots.

  An hour later, we are on the boat ride. The engine sputters and roars, and a group of loud Australian tourists at the front are already passing beer cans. It looks exactly the kind of thing you shouldn’t do. Aditi sits opposite me, staring out at the impossibly blue water.

  The guide, a skinny kid with a wide smile, oversees a clumsy, awkward process of figuring out what size fits whom. The mask feels tight and alien on my face. The snorkel tastes of salt.

  ‘This smells weird,’ Aditi mutters, holding the snorkel away from her face, and then puts it on.

  ‘First time snorkelling?’ the guide asks us cheerfully.

  ‘Yeah,’ I reply.

  ‘You will love it!’ he beams. ‘Many fish today! Big ones, small ones. Nemo fish!’

  We both look at each other. We both don’t say we’re scared, but we are . . . a little. How can we not be? When we get to the spot, the drunk Australians jump in first. Seeing them frolic makes me feel like it can’t be that bad. The guide tells us to jump in. I go first. A jarring plunge from the noisy boat. Water everywhere. A slight panic, after which the guide asks me to put on my mask and peer in.

  ‘I will wait for her!’ I tell the guide.

  And then, she jumps in.

  ‘Are you okay?’ I ask her.

  She nods, spitting out water. And then, everything changes.

  The world above vanishes, replaced by a sea of blue. The roar of the engine and the shouts of the guide are gone, replaced by the muffled sound of my own breathing. A slow, rhythmic hiss. The light filters down in shifting columns, illuminating a world I didn’t know existed. Technically, I know it did; I have seen it in movies, but it seemed . . . unreachable? Schools of electric-yellow fish dart past my mask. And then others. The guide keeps busy pointing to the fish. A hiding octopus. A turtle. Or a tortoise? Whatever it is. It’s beautiful.

  I look for Aditi. She’s a few feet away, a small, solitary figure suspended in the vast blue. She’s pointing at a Nemo fish(!), and for a moment, through the distorted glass of our masks, our eyes meet.

  Then I see it. A current, subtle but strong, is pulling her away from the boat, towards the deeper water. She doesn’t seem to notice at first. Then I see the shift in her body. The frantic kicking. The slight panic in her eyes. My own body moves before my brain does. I kick hard, my fins clumsy but powerful, closing the distance between us. I reach out and grab her hand.

  Her hand is small and cold in mine. Through our masks, our eyes lock again.

  The guide swims right in front of us, shrugging like it was nothing. Was the panic imagined?

  But it wasn’t imagined. There was panic, there is panic. The panic of being left alone. And so we don’t drift away. We just float there for a long moment, holding hands, tethered together, two small specks, tiny, insignificant, in the overwhelming silence of the ocean.

  Back on the boat, the noise of the world rushes back in. The engine, the Australians, the guide bombarding us with questions, the sun beating down on my neck. The silence between Aditi and me feels different now. I feel a strange, fierce protectiveness towards her, followed immediately by a wave of crushing guilt.

  What right do I have to feel protective of anyone? Should I ever even be allowed to have the responsibility of anyone?

  ‘Not bad,’ she says, pulling off her mask and running a hand through her wet hair. Her face is pale.

  ‘Not bad,’ I repeat.

  Back at the room, more tired than we expected, we eat room service on opposite ends of the room. I watch Aditi retreat into the blue glow of her phone where I know she will scroll till she drifts away. I feel the familiar pull. The need to process it, to talk about it, to make sense of today.

  But the person I need to talk to isn’t here.

  I walk out on to the balcony, closing the glass door behind me. I take out my phone, my thumb hovering over the app. I need to tell her about the silence, the fish, the feeling of Aditi’s hand in mine.

  I need to process the day’s beauty and sadness with the only person I can.

  PART 3

  SIX MONTHS LATER

  28

  Aditi

  My world is the size of this dining table.

  It’s no longer a place where we eat. To be honest, we never really ate here. This was always the place for unopened courier boxes. But now, it’s a battlefield of sticky notes, an artwork of semi-circular coffee stains, and the command centre of the North India chapter of ‘Connect’.

  I like how I say ‘command centre’. Makes it seem important. But it is important.

  Our house-help gave up trying to clean the table weeks ago. Now, she just wipes around the perimeter of my chaos. A stack of printouts with potential event venues sits precariously close to a half-eaten bowl of Chocos. A bunch of charging cables lies entangled. My laptop screen glows—a dozen tabs open. Kunal keeps saying that it would completely nuke my battery, but there’s no other way I know how to work. Right now, I’m toggling between a spreadsheet of RSVPs and Canva where I’m tweaking the font on a new event poster. We have a couple of designers with fragile egos, so I prefer making the finishing changes myself. The headline: ‘Stop Swiping, Start Talking’ font is beautiful, but we are going to run ads on this and this won’t fly.

  I toggle through the various fonts when I get and receive the conference call. It’s Sameer from on-ground activation and Kunal, my boss.

  ‘Hello?’ I say.

  ‘The final number?’ asks Kunal, in his low, calm voice.

  ‘We’re looking at eighty-five confirmed, but we are going to run ads now. So expect around a hundred and ten,’ I inform him.

  ‘Cool,’ says Sameer.

  ‘Let’s close the list at a hundred,’ says Kunal. ‘The venue is unevenly spaced. We should avoid overcrowding and people getting overwhelmed. Remember that—’

  I complete Kunal’s sentence. The one he has said multiple times and has become a little bit of a mantra in the team. ‘. . . this is their last chance at love.’

  That’s what Connect strives to do: match people. To create love from where there wasn’t any.

  He gives a small laugh. ‘Good work with the promotions though.’

  ‘The analytics on that last video are insane,’ I remind him, referencing the funny, sometimes terrible and cringey videos we have started making for Connect’s social media handle. ‘We should double down on that strategy. That’s what works these days. Aesthetics are out, craziness is in.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, you were right. You don’t have to hard sell that any more. I’m onboard,’ he says. I can hear the smile in his voice. ‘Also, we are starting the Vizag chapter next month. Aditi—’

  I cut him lest he hears reluctance in a pause. ‘I will be on it,’ I say. Automatically, I start pacing the small area between the table and the sofa, a habit I’ve picked up during these calls. It feels good to move, to feel the energy of what I’m working on.

  ‘Brilliant,’ he says. ‘If it gets too much, let me know, okay?’

  ‘No, it won’t,’ I say categorically. And then add before he changes his mind, ‘By the way, I’ve spoken to the brewery manager. He has agreed to give three wait staff just for us.’

  ‘You’re a rock star, Aditi,’ says Kunal, and adds after a quick pause. ‘You too, Sameer. Don’t feel left out.’

  Sameer laughs throatily. ‘Yeah, yeah.’

  Just then, the sound of a door opening makes me look up.

  My pacing stops. Raghav emerges from his room. It’s almost noon. He’s wearing the same grey T-shirt I’m tired of looking at, and a pair of faded shorts. He walks past me like I don’t exist. The usual. Then, he goes to the kitchen, opens the fridge, stares into it for a full minute, then closes it without taking anything out. It’s a ritual I’ve seen a hundred times. That’s usual too.

  ‘Anything else, guys?’ asks Kunal.

  ‘No, I’m good,’ I say. ‘Talk later?’

  I hang up just as Raghav turns from the sink, a glass of water in his hand.

  ‘Hey,’ I say, trying not to lose the excitement I have for the work that needs to be done today. ‘Morning.’

  ‘It’s afternoon,’ he says and then drinks the water in one long gulp.

  He turns away from me and puts two slices of bread into the toaster and stares, waiting for it to pop out. Music spills out from the headphones that are hanging from his neck. His playlist is just ten songs. It’s not even his playlist, it’s Megha’s. He hasn’t added one song in the last nineteen months. I want to talk to him, but of late I’m running out of ways to talk to him. Sooner or later, I know we will hit a roadblock and we will end up in a screaming match. The usual.

  ‘That was work,’ I offer, gesturing vaguely at my phone.

  ‘I know,’ he nods.

  ‘We’re doing a soft launch for a new event series on Friday. At that new brewery in Sector 29.’

  ‘Great,’ he says. The slices pop out.

  ‘You should come. It’ll be fun.’

  He doesn’t answer. Instead, he butters his toast. He has warned me about this before as well—about trying to find love for him. But then, just because he thinks he’s right about wallowing in a world that’s make-believe doesn’t make him right. I have to make him see that, no matter how many screaming matches we might find ourselves in. He turns around slowly. My face is already warm. He looks at me, then his eyes drift to my cluttered table, to the cheerful poster on my laptop screen. A look I have seen before settles on his face.

  ‘Another one of your selling people on their “last chance at love”?’ he asks, his voice flat, taking a deliberate bite of his toast.

  ‘I mean—’

  ‘It’s just funny,’ he continues with malice in his voice, chewing slowly.

  ‘There’s nothing funny—’

  ‘This whole idea that you can find “the one”. There’s no “The One”. People fall in love all the time. Sometimes right after the last one.’

  ‘That’s unfair.’

  ‘At the end of the day, no one cares,’ he says. ‘Everyone’s just out there trying to fucking kill their loneliness.’

  The words land like a slap.

  ‘I’m not in love,’ I defend myself though I know there’s no point defending anything to him because he will only hear what he wants to hear.

  He smiles mockingly at me. This studied nonchalance is irritating. I know he cares. I know he cares a little too much.

  ‘That’s not fair, Raghav,’ I say, my own voice turning cold.

  ‘Why are you getting so defensive? Kunal’s a nice guy . . . the literal definition of tall, dark and handsome . . . is also older, so your type.’

  My ears burn. I don’t want to fight, I tell myself. This is a boy I care about.

  He continues, ‘I’m happy for you.’

  Of course, he’s mocking me. He waits for my repartee. When none comes, he turns and goes back to his room, closing the door behind him. I stand there, my fists clenched, my throat tight. The thrill of the phone call is now completely gone, replaced by a familiar, heavy ache. Why do I let him do this to me? Why do I let him drag me through this? I look at my toppling stacks of paper, the evidence of my new life, and it feels . . . dirty somehow? Am I not allowed to feel happiness? No. I won’t let him do that.

  My phone buzzes. It’s a video call from Tejal. I take a deep breath, force a smile and answer even though I know she’s going to catch it no matter how much I smile.

  ‘You look stressed,’ is the first thing she says. And then a frown creeps up on her face. ‘Don’t tell me. Him again.’

  ‘Yaar, Tejal,’ I mutter to myself.

  I just nod, turning to look out the window. I can see the city moving on below, cars zipping through. Everyone is going somewhere. Except him. And us. He’s an invisible cloak around me, reminding me that we should have never come out of the dark. That I should stay there with him.

  ‘What did he say this time?’ she asks, her voice already laced with anger. A true friend is angrier at things you’re angry at.

  ‘The usual,’ I say. ‘Must be nice to be in love . . . and spreading love . . . the kind of things he says to hurt me . . . that my happiness is like . . . dirty.’

  Tejal sighs. ‘Okay, let’s not talk about it. Work’s going fine?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s going a little too well,’ I say, a flicker of my earlier pride returning.

  Tejal smiles warmly. ‘Look, Aditi. You’re building something cool. You’re allowed to be proud of it. You’re allowed to move on and do stuff. I’m telling you, I’m super super super proud of you.’

  ‘I feel your words in my mind. But it doesn’t go to my heart,’ I say, ‘but sometimes . . . anyway. Achcha, I’ve got to do something. I will talk to you later. Lots of stuff to do.’

  I cut the call and try to will myself to conjure up the joy I felt just a few moments ago. As I walk out to the balcony, I turn and see him. He’s on the phone.

  He’s texting someone.

  Is he texting her?

  I don’t know what I feel any more.

  Sometimes it’s anger, sometimes it feels so pathetic to see him like this. All I want to do is reach out and throw his phone away.

  Like I did that time.

  ‘SHE IS NOT REAL!’ I had screamed. ‘This is not how you heal!’

  And in response, he had called me a parasitic, selfish bitch and told me to fuck off.

  Even now, I want to make him understand that what I’m doing is real, the life that I’m leading is real. Unlike his. What I’m doing isn’t cruel, an insult to their memory, but what he’s doing is.

  Just then, he turns, as if sensing my stare. Our eyes meet across the small space separating our balconies. For a long, tense moment, neither of us moves. I see a flicker of something in his eyes—anger, pain, maybe both, definitely abandonment—before his face goes blank. There was a time it was the two of us on that survival raft, and now it’s just him. But it’s his choice. It’s his choice. He’s willingly paddling into the storm. That’s what I keep telling myself.